Mansion House initiative calls for support for fund manager start-ups

Gill Wadsworth brought us the news this week that a group of City experts has demanded that UK regulators must overhaul the regulatory regime for new fund management companies to "prevent the UK slipping further behind international rivals".

Speaking at a formal meeting at the Mansion House on 22 May, the group, comprising lawyers, investment bankers and representatives from the Independent Investment Management Initiative (IIMI), demanded the Treasury and the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) end the "excessive costs, delays, and complexity currently facing new asset management firms in the UK".

The cost of setting up a fund management firm can extend up to GDP1 million when indirect expenses are added in, the group says, with Dani Hristova, CEO, IIMI, saying: "As it stands, fund management start-ups are largely reserved for individuals with deep personal wealth. This undermines diversity, innovation and growth."

We had another interview this week bringing you Arnaud Claudon, Head of Asset Managers and Asset Owners Client Lines, Securities Services, BNP Paribas, who explains that the global custodian that his team focuses on supporting buy-side market participants such as asset owners and asset managers’ client lines.

Claudon believes that there is a shift in the industry and that the one size fits all approach that prevailed is increasingly irrelevant.

"In terms of asset servicing and our custodian role, we are the backbone and the guys managing the pipelines and pipes," he says.

"Our business model is to accrue volumes on custodian platforms/industrial platforms in the sense that we are handling massive industrial scale volumes, running around the clock following the sun, safekeeping trillions of assets."

Claudon notes standardisation of processes and reducing costs is what custodians do and that recently the volumes in the market have been tremendous.

I will be chairing some of the ETF panels at IMPower Fund Forum in June. For a 10 per cent discount to attend, use this link and code: FKN3972ETFX. I hope to see you there.

Beverly Chandler, Managing Editor, Institutional Asset Manager

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