Firing lineSep 7 2022

Bordier: 'Not for sale, never has been, never will be'

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Bordier: 'Not for sale, never has been, never will be'
Jamie MacLeod, chief executive of Bordier UK

Bordier & Cie's independence is a matter of immense pride for Jamie MacLeod.

The chief executive of Bordier UK, MacLeod is, of course, no stranger to UK financial services, and has witnessed plenty of corporate activity within the industry over the past three decades.

He started out at Laurentian Life and Laurentian Unit Trust Management before working on retail funds and actuarial based pension fund management with Scottish Widows in the early stages of his career.

MacLeod moved from this to do what he calls "the purest form of asset management", with Investec.

He became a very familiar figure among advisers in the early to late-2000s for his work with Skandia, which was a conglomerate of platforms, retail and institutional fund management businesses.

MacLeod says: "I am now chief executive in another distinct area of financial services, as part of a specialist investment manager, providing investment and wealth management services to both UK and international private clients."

These clients include professional advisers, wealthy individuals, family offices, trustees, charities, livery companies and numerous institutions, he adds.

We are under no pressure to deliver specific growth targets.MacLeod

He joined and acquired 20 per cent of Bordier UK (then called Berry Asset Management) in September 2010 as chief executive and became a member of the group executive team with Bordier & Cie, the 178-year-old Swiss private bank that is the majority shareholder of Bordier UK.

MacLeod likes being at the helm. He says: "This is my 25th year as a chief executive and I’m enjoying it every bit as much as I did at the start, when I was 29.

"I like working with the Bordier brothers and all the team in the wider business – the freedom they give me to manage the business has meant our partnership has been a success for clients, staff, and shareholders alike."

But despite all the merger and acquisition activity he has witnessed over the past 25 years, MacLeod does not see any similar activity for Bordier & Cie, one of the few private, family-owned businesses of scale operating in the UK, and whose independence he robustly defends.

He says: "Our corporate status and considerable financial strength are the bedrock upon which our business is built, and help us to plan with a long-term mindset."

Indeed, the fifth-generation, family-owned business serves more than 4,000 families around the world.

MacLeod adds: "Bordier, as we often say, ‘is not for sale, never has been, and never will be’ – and as an independent, privately held business of 178 years’ standing, it has no external shareholders. 

"That means we are under no pressure to deliver specific growth targets and can put our clients first; that is important, as growth is for us but a by-product of doing a great job for our clients.

"If we get that right, our reputation builds, and the business will grow." 

Organic growth

While Bordier cannot be bought, it can buy and grow – organically and through partnerships.

He states: "My overarching priority and focus is on delivering the best possible outcomes to those who place their trust in us – our existing clients.

"That means building a great team. I want to recruit and develop high-quality talent, for my colleagues to see Bordier as a brilliant place to work, and to ensure they enjoy the working environment we have created."

The business has grown over the past few months, as MacLeod states: "We have welcomed some new faces in recent months, adding further depth to the team, and, as we look to develop the business, expect to announce further hires in the weeks ahead."

With more than 50 new clients onboarded already this year, alongside "one of the largest outsourced institutional DFM mandates in the adviser universe", he says that "we are comfortable with our progress", citing enviable capital and liquidity ratios.

MacLeod adds: "We’ve got the right team, morale is good, and we’re in the right space, having faced many challenges since I joined more than 12 years ago."

We are not well known from a name awareness point of view.MacLeod

The firm is also keen on partnerships and working with professionals such as financial advisers. 

He explains: "We are looking to further develop our network of relationships with financial advisory firms, lawyers and accountants, as well as to build on our existing provider partnerships (of course), but we have deliberately refrained from recklessly targeting all-out expansion of our asset book.

"As a private firm, we don’t need to worry about impressing the financial analysts."

But how does Bordier sit within the UK market, and how well known is the company among advisers looking for a discretionary fund manager provider?

MacLeod admits: "We are not well known from a name awareness point of view.

"However, many of the professional community we look to work with are aware of our competencies."

Moreover, he says Bordier does not have ambitions to be well known, rather to partner with a small number of high-quality, strategic partners, which he describes as "those aligned with our core values, and with whom we can create a genuine partnership".

Like being given the heads-up on a great new restaurant, we quite like the idea that advisers, introducers and gatekeepers tell their clients about a company they may never have heard about.MacLeod

He attributes this flexible approach as a major factor in Bordier winning "three significant adviser firm mandates in recent times", at circa £200mn, £150mn and £110mn.

The £200mn mandate was awarded in 2021 by Richmond House; the other two, it is understood, are yet to be announced publicly. 

But the firm has also worked with other companies. For example, as reported by FTAdviser at the time, Bordier UK launched a decumulation service mapped to Dynamic Planner risk profiles in April this year (2022).

He adds: "We prefer to be known and appreciated for our service and approach among high-quality distribution partners, analytical researchers and the professional services cohort in our industry.

"Perhaps like being given the heads-up on a great new restaurant, we quite like the idea that advisers, introducers and gatekeepers tell their clients about a company they may never have heard about."

Post-Skandia 

For eight years or so back in the early 2000s, MacLeod was the figurehead and chief executive of the Skandia Investment Group – at its peak it was a £50bn, mega platform/multi-manager.

Skandia, which launched in the UK in 1979, was bought by Old Mutual in 2006, and in 2014 the rebranding of Skandia's platform to Old Mutual Wealth was announced. In 2021 it rebranded to Quilter. 

Since then, how well does MacLeod think the platform market has evolved?

He comments: "A wonderful business opportunity was presented to us very recently, which caused me to take a closer look at an industry-leading platform, its systems, operational model and processes.

"It was a flashback to my very enjoyable days at Skandia. Little has changed in platforms from my angle of sight.

"The sometimes-aired view or notion that enhanced technology means nobody sees or touches anything on the platform simply isn’t right. There are still way, way too many manual processes."

He says that while the discussions have moved on, this has been against a backdrop of substantial growth in the adviser platform market. "They represent nowhere like 20 years' worth of evolution".

And there are still many challenges facing professional advisers. MacLeod says: "The list [of challenges] is long and endless, but the industry has shown its resolve in overcoming many of them over the decades."

simoney.kyriakou@ft.com