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Meet the Cast

Daniel Fenton - 29/08/2018

Daniel Fenton, Lowes Financial Management

CompareStructuredProducts.com currently lists eight different providers of structured products, this being all of the providers in the UK market whom we are potentially prepared to expose our clients to. Here we will ask; who are they, where did they come from, and how have they impacted the market? In order to provide a brief profile on each provider, giving insight into the name behind the products.

Investec Structured Products

Investec started life as a small finance company in Johannesburg, South Africa in 1974 and grew to become an international specialist bank and asset manager. In 2008, “Investec Structured Products” launched their first product set and since then the business has issued over 1370 retail structured deposits and investments catering to a wide range of portfolios. A recent addition is the Investec/Lowes 8:8 Plan created with input from ourselves with our clients in mind. Currently there are twenty-four Investec products on CompareStructuredProducts.com, of which three, have been granted ‘Preferred’ status.

Dura Capital

Dura Capital is a new player in the structured products market. They were established in March 2018 as the retail structured products arm of institutional Structured Product specialist Catley Lakeman Securities. As a new provider, Dura have hosted informative adviser facing seminars across the country, as well as producing valuable research on the sector. They have released 9 products to date with Credit Suisse and Citi Group as counterparties. Dura Capital’s strategy includes offering contracts with shorter offer periods with a view to achieving slightly better coupons.

Mariana was founded in 2009 as a brokerage firm and has since evolved into a global financial solutions provider. Their structured product division was created in 2012 and has since launched over 120 products. Like Investec, Mariana have teamed up with Lowes to develop a structured investment plan, the Mariana 10:10 plan, now in its 25th issue; further information about option 1 of the latest 10:10 Plan can be found here, and option 2 here.

Walker Crips Structured Investments

Walker Crips Structured Investments is a division of Walker Crips Stockbrokers, one of the City of London’s oldest independent companies. Since their creation in 2008, they have launched more than 250 retail products utilising a wide range of counterparties (currently HSBC, Morgan Stanley and Goldman Sachs). Lowes Financial Management has been working with Walker Crips since the launch of their first product, granting “Preferred” status to many of their plans through the years and negotiating several exclusive offers for our clients.

Tempo Structured Products are part of Alpha Real Capital (established in 2005). Tempo are a new branch of Alpha and have launched their first structured products this year utilising Morgan Stanley and Societe Generale as counterparties. To date, Tempo have released 7 structured products onto the market.

Meteor Asset Management

Meteor is an asset management company that has been in the market for the past twelve years and is currently one of the largest structured product providers in the UK. Meteor has issued more than 560 retail products since its creation utilising a wide range of counterparties. On more than one occasion Meteor have taken over the clients and books of business from other structured product providers, in a seamless and professional manner without cost to the client.

Société Générale are one of the largest European financial services groups; their work includes retail, corporate and investment banking. While the bank acts as counterparty to other providers they have been issuing their own branded retail products to the UK market since 2011and have launched more than 270 products to date. Société Générale are known for their UK Four Option plans in which the counterparty risk is spread over four financial institutions rather than all risk exposed to one.

Hilbert Investment solutions are a French company who entered the UK in 2015, introducing their first structured product in 2017. They since have released 6 structured products, all of which are income plans.

Dan is a Structured Product Technician at Lowes Financial Management.

Disclosure of interests: Lowes has provided input into the concept, development, promotion and distribution of the 10:10 Plan and 8:8 Plan. The provider’s charges/fees are built into the terms of the investment - Lowes has a commercial interest in both Plan. All Plan returns are stated after allowing for these charges/fees. Where Lowes is involved in advice on or the intermediation of these investments to retail clients, it will not be paid any fee from Mariana/Investec for its input but Mariana/Investec will instead donate equivalent funds to the Charities Aid Foundation (Registered Charity Number 268369) which will then be allocated to various other UK Registered charities at the direction of the Lowes Charity Committee, the annual report for which is available on request. The aim of developing Plans in co-operation with providers, with Lowes input, is that they should be amongst the best available in the market – and, as such, be granted ‘Preferred’ status, on their merits. Lowes has robust systems and controls in place to ensure that it manages any actual or potential conflicts of interests in its activities.