The spat between nationwide Monetary Planner Tavistock and its former wealth supervisor Titan has worsened with Tavistock instigating authorized motion agains Titan.
The shock axing of the tie-up, agreed in June 2021, was issued to the inventory market late on Monday.
Within the announcement Tavistock mentioned: “This follows a sustained interval of unacceptable efficiency by Titan.”
Titan subsequently issued a counter assertion accusing Tavistock of “critical wrongful conduct” in ending the deal below which Titan managed Tavistock funds.
In a Inventory Change announcement at this time Tavistock said: “The assertion made to the press by Titan on 9 July 2024 seems to mirror Titan’s view of the dispute, following Tavistock’s choice to terminate. Tavistock strongly denies the suggestion of wrongful conduct and considers that Titan’s allegations are false and have been put ahead as a retaliatory step.
“The matter is now topic to pre-action correspondence and Tavistock doesn’t suggest to remark additional at this stage.”
In its assertion at this time, Tavistock additionally printed information from information agency FE Analytics highlighting what it calls the underperformance of Titan funds, with 5 Acumen Funds managed by Titan rating within the fourth quartile for efficiency between Aug 2022 and January this yr. Among the funds cited are at or close to the underside of their sectors, in response to Tavistock utilizing FE Analytics figures.
Ascot-based Tavistock has suffered losses in latest occasions and has been reviewing future technique, though it not too long ago mentioned it had seen some enchancment financially. Final month it confirmed that it was contemplating “a variety of potential transactions” together with a bid from rival Monetary Planner Saltus for a part of its enterprise.
In response, Titan says it has a declare for damages after Tavistock ended the funding settlement. Titan has been requested for additional remark.
Earlier in June Tavistock government chairman Oliver Cooke moved from an government chair position to change into non-exec chair.
Final October Tavistock reported higher buying and selling after beforehand making a lack of almost £1m. The earlier yr the group reaped a windfall revenue of £30.67m after the sale of its funding arm Tavistock Wealth to Titan Wealth in August 2021 for an preliminary sum of £20m.
Regardless of its struggles Tavistock has continued to make acquisitions. In April final yr the corporate acquired Exact Shield, a UK-wide safety enterprise primarily based in Bangor, Northern Eire, which it anticipated to be a significant contributor to the long run profitability of the group and has been built-in into the enterprise.
Following the transaction, Tavistock now has a community of greater than 400 advisers and different enterprise introducers working with greater than 110,000 UK retail purchasers with whole belongings estimated to be greater than £6bn, in addition to 350 company and affinity purchasers with some 16,000 staff.
