Author: Aisha Mahmood

The Income Protection Task Force (IPTF) has brought its IPTF 7 Claims Stories series to a close, publishing the final instalment of an industry-wide project that spent the past 18 months examining the income protection (IP) claims journey from start to finish.What the IPTF 7 Claims Stories series set out to doThe concluding episode draws on feedback gathered from advisers, insurers, reinsurers and claims professionals across IPTF’s member and affiliate firms. Together, those contributions form a collective view of what good claims handling looks like in practice. For anyone advising clients who hold income protection policies, or considering IP as…

Canaccord Wealth has appointed Adam Smith as chief operating officer of its wealth planning division, a hire the firm positions as central to its ambition to unite financial planning and investment management within a single, integrated client proposition. Smith joins from Quilter, where he spent two years leading the firm’s advice transformation programme. A depth of experience behind the Canaccord Wealth planning COO role According to PAM Insight, Smith brings more than 25 years of industry experience to the role. Before Quilter, he served on Fairstone’s executive committee for six years, where he was responsible for discretionary investment management arm…

Hargreaves Lansdown’s cashback offer has doubled in scale, with the platform now paying up to £10,000 per eligible account to encourage existing clients to consolidate assets onto its platform, in what it describes as its largest-ever cashback campaign.The promotion opened on 1 October and runs until 30 November. It is available exclusively to existing clients transferring or contributing assets into a Stocks and Shares ISA, Fund and Share Account, SIPP, or SIPP Income Drawdown account. The previous maximum cashback available through HL campaigns stood at £5,000, making this a meaningful step up in competitive intensity.How the Hargreaves Lansdown cashback offer…

Fidelity International has made its Fidelity active ETF launch concrete with two new funds in an Equity Enhanced Yield range, combining fundamental stock research with a systematic options overlay designed to generate additional income above standard equity returns. The Fidelity Global Equity Enhanced Yield UCITS ETF and the Fidelity US Equity Enhanced Yield UCITS ETF both listed on Germany’s Xetra and Italy’s Borsa Italiana on 2 October 2026, with a London Stock Exchange listing scheduled for 05 October 2026.What the Options Overlay Means for Income-Seeking InvestorsThe Fidelity active ETF launch sits squarely in the growing market for income-oriented UCITS products…

True Potential’s tiered platform fees, which replace its longstanding flat-rate structure from 1 October, will reduce the blended charge for clients holding more than £150,000 on the platform, in a move the firm says forms part of a wider programme of technology and platform investment.For savers and retirees building meaningful portfolio balances, the mechanics are straightforward. Clients continue to pay the existing rate of 0.4% on assets up to £150,000. Assets between £150,001 and £500,000 attract a charge of 0.3%, holdings between £500,001 and £5 million are charged at 0.2%, and assets above £5 million carry no ongoing platform fee…

The debate around AI in financial advice has moved well beyond whether firms should adopt the technology and towards the harder questions of data quality, governance and who bears responsibility when something goes wrong. Chris Davies, founder and director of Model Office, sets out why those questions matter more than the tools themselves.The data problem beneath the AI opportunityMost advice firms already hold substantial client data. The difficulty is that it sits in fragments: spread across CRMs, cashflow tools, suitability reports, document stores, compliance systems and spreadsheets. Before AI can add analytical value, that information needs to be connected, consistent…

St James’s Place is seeking regulatory approval to wind up its SJP Diversified Assets Fund closure, having concluded that the £1.4 billion vehicle no longer has a long-term role within its investment proposition. The wealth manager has suspended the Diversified Assets (FAIF) Unit Trust and submitted an application to the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) to formally close it.SJP attributed the decision to a strategic review and what it described as a ‘shift in demand’ for the strategy as the alternatives and private markets landscape has evolved. For investors holding units in the fund, the immediate question is how an orderly…

UK regional VCT investment is gaining ground, with data pointing to a meaningful redistribution of equity capital away from London and towards the North West, Scotland and beyond. For investors managing a balanced portfolio through a Venture Capital Trust (VCT) wrapper, that shift raises questions about manager selection, geographic reach and the sourcing advantages that local networks can provide. How the capital flows are changing for UK regional VCT investment London’s dominance in UK smaller-business equity investment remains, but it is eroding. In 2024, the capital accounted for 60% of UK smaller-business equity investment; by 2025, that share had fallen…

W1M, the wealth and investment management firm founded in 2024 to serve high-net-worth and ultra-high-net-worth individuals, has confirmed the Wenyu Bai W1M appointment as its first dedicated head of artificial intelligence, bringing in the former occupant of the same role at St James’s Place.Bai took up the newly created position earlier this month, carrying more than 18 years of experience across wealth management, pension investment consultancy, and AI and automation leadership. A Chartered Actuary, according to PIMFA, she brings an actuarial rigour to a discipline that too often rewards enthusiasm over analytical discipline. That combination of quantitative grounding and applied…