In a trading update released on Friday, WH Ireland Group PLC said it continues to discuss and is seeking to achieve a negotiated settlement with the FCA in regard to its review into WH Ireland’s business in the period between January-June 2013.
The investigation, which concerns WH Ireland’s control procedures, started in April last year. It centres around whether the firm broke Principle 3 in FCA’s Rules of Business, which states that “a firm must take reasonable care to organise and control its affairs responsibly and effectively, with adequate risk management systems.”
According to Richard Killingbeck, WH Ireland’s CEO, the company expects a marginal increase in total revenue on that reported last year, “which is a reasonable performance, given the more challenging trading environment since the half-year end.”
The update said that as a result there was a fall in transaction fees and market making revenue in the corporate broking division. This, however, was offset by continued growth in recurring fee income from both corporate broking and wealth management”.
“Despite the significant repositioning of the business during the past year, we expect to report an increase in operating profit for the year when compared with that reported in 2014,” the statement said.
The firm went from 93 to 98 clients during the financial year, and the statement showed recurring revenue across the company has continued to rise and is now close to 37% of total revenue.
It also mentioned that management fee income in WH Ireland’s private wealth management division increased by about 35% from the previous year. Assets under management and administration on an adjusted basis rose by 2% over the year to £2.5 bn. Of this total, discretionary assets rose by 6% to around £770m.
The wealth manager will release its full-year figures to 30 November on 29 February 2016.
