Brewin Dolphin chief executive David Nicol to leave wealth manager
Brewin Dolphin has announced that David Nicol will retire as chief executive of the wealth manager in June.
Nicol, who has been with the company for eight years, will be replaced by Robin Beer, who currently runs Brewin Dolphin’s intermediaries, charity, professional services and digital businesses.
Chairman Simon Miller thanked Nicol for his “outstanding contribution to Brewin Dolphin’s success”.
“He has demonstrated great professionalism, re-focused the Group’s strategy, improved the quality of the organisation and built a strong team,” Miller said.
The FTSE 250 company also issued a trading update for the first quarter of its financial year.
Total funds increased 7.8 per cent to £48.5bn in the three months ending 31 December, boosted by the acquisition of £2.7bn funds from Investec Capital & Investments. Excluding acquired funds, total funds increased 1.8 per cent.
Brewin Dolphin bought Investec’s Irish wealth management business for €44m (£37m) in November.
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Discretionary funds grew 4.2 per cent to £41.8bn in the quarter, including £1bn of acquired funds. The company said the increase was driven by a strong investment performance and positive organic net inflows.
Excluding acquired funds, discretionary funds increased by 1.7 per cent.
Total quarterly income for the wealth manager increased 15.3 per cent to £89.6m, £4m of which was a result of recent acquisitions.
“I am pleased with our performance in the quarter, particularly our positive organic net inflows in challenging market conditions,” said Nicol.
“We have diversified our business mix through building more client choice and client-centric propositions, which is supporting our growth.”
Nicol said the integration of the Irish Investec acquisition was progressing well and that Brewin Dolphin “remain confident about the long-term growth opportunities”.
“Market sentiment appears to be improving and we look forward to capitalising on this as the year progresses.”
Brewin Dolphin shares had risen 0.11 by late morning.