34
Special report profeSSional ServiceS
One of the
benefits you get from
working with other
professional service
providers is you can
feed off one another
by bringing new
ideas to the table
and you can put lots
of different advisers
together in a mutually
beneficial way
“
”
David austin, head of private
client financial planning,
Cazenove
BankS
“One of the benefits
you get from working with
other professional service
providers is you can
feed off one another by
bringing new ideas to the
table and you can put
lots of different advisers
together in a mutually beneficial
way.
“For instance, we have
spent a lot of time talking
to the trust companies
in the past couple of
years about the various tax
structures that are available
and how they can
use them.
“There has been a lot
of work around establishing
trust-like structures;
something that looks
and acts like a trust but
is not a trust. We have
been talking to a lot of
trust companies about this
sort of ideas at the behest
of London-based professional
advisers.
“A prime example of
such discussions is family
partnerships, which avoid
some of the taxes associated
with onshore trusts
– these are something we
have been creating for the
past couple of years and
it is a growing market,
with international banks in
London picking up on it
in particular.”
l Non-retail
Gurr says further attractions
in using discretionary
managers, above their
technical expertise, come
through their access to
non-retail asset classes.
“Most financial planners
are restricted to using only
mainstream asset classes
– often utilising retail collectives,
and may not be
able to access institutional
terms for their clients,” he
explains. “Institutional structured
products and single
strategy hedge funds are
often beyond their authority
and expertise.
“We have the scale to
attract some of the world’s
leading analysts and economists
and the resources
to develop cutting-edge
research tools, sophisticated
asset allocation models
and quantitative analysis
programs that play a crucial
part in the delivery
of a high quality, reliable,
repeatable service.”
The time is right
With most run-of-the mill banking products currently
offering virtually no return, investors are crying out
for accounts that can guarantee a fixed rate interest.
Now is the time for banks to really market their
structured products to IFAs and their clients
the QropS route
BY DANIEL JUDGE
The Heritage Group, a Channel Islands-based insurance and
pensions company, has recently moved into the QROPS international
pension sector.
The company is keen to work with IFAs on its new proposition,
which Julian Travers, IFA, life, pensions and investment, at Heritage,
says offers advisers many benefits.
“The investment flexibility is vast. There are also attractive
features such as the fact that in the event of death benefits pass
straight to the beneficiaries, unlike UK pensions, which can be taxed
up to 82% before it goes to the beneficiaries,” he says.
He also notes that an adviser
can white label Heritage’s
scheme and retain control
of the underlying pension
investments, so ensuring they
continue to receive fees on it.
The product has a minimum
fee of £1,000 and much of the
cost will depend on the size of
the investment and what the
investor wants to do with it.
Travers also believes
some advisers may be missing
Travers: ‘flexible investment’ business by not getting involved
in QROPS.
“IFAs are finding themselves in the situation where they are
losing business because they do not have a route to a QROPS that
allows them to continue to look after the client. We allow them
to do this,” he remarks.
“It is difficult to quantify just how big QROPS is going to be,
but certainly at the top end of the market and for anyone who is
already overseas but has a UK pension or is moving overseas,
QROPS should be considered. So from your internationally mobile
high net worth individuals to your Brit down in the Costas, these
are of interest.”
“It is hard to guess but I think tens of millions of pounds must
be leaving UK pension funds into QROPS every month.”
By Helen Burggraf
Although stock markets
appear to be fighting back
from lows reached in early
March, capital protection
remains a buzzword
among investors.
As conventional bank
accounts continue to pay
next to nothing in interest,
a battle has begun to woo
savers – and the IFAs who
advise them – with copperbottomed,earthquakeproof
products that generate
fixed rates of return.
At Isle of Man-based
Anglo Irish Bank Corp
(International), head of
retail product and sales
Gary Quaggan notes that
the company’s recent
introduction of a number
of fixed interest accounts
within a month was “not
something we have really
done before”, and was
largely in response to IFA
and investor feedback,
which he says is showing
a pronounced appetite for
these kinds of products.
David Wilkinson, director
of intermediary distribution
at Standard Bank
Offshore, says IFAs seem
enamoured of its one-year
INTERNATIONAL ADVISER [www.international-adviser.com] MAy 2009
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