Our regular round-up of the latest insights on investment distribution

Big week in platform world. The industry’s worst kept secret finally became a reality as Aegon confirmed it was buying Cofunds. Experts and their mums took to Twitter, LinkedIn and blogs to share the ‘deets’ and offer their views. Having had a bit of time to...

Aegon’s acquisition of Cofunds would create a combined entity with £87.7 billion in assets under administration (AUA). If we include the assets from the BlackRock acquisition, AUA stands at circa £97.9 billion. Taking into account retail assets only, the combined...

Aside from great chocolate, stunning ski resorts and high-quality watches, Switzerland is home to a global hub for wealth management. There are 586 banks and more than 3,500 independent wealth managers operating in a country with a population of 8m. Fund groups of...

As from yesterday, Scalable Capital is now fully live in the UK. While it might represent the next generation of robo-adviser from an investment management perspective, the future for ‘independents’ looks challenging as they struggle to achieve scale. Having said...

Ah, summer. The Platforum team is bobbing in the Italian med with buckets of gelato back on the beach. OK, not really. In fact, we’re stuck in our offices like you. And it has been a busy week. Between publishing three reports (Consumer Insights update, the Sweden...

We had the good fortune to sit round a few tables this week – round, horseshoe, oval and others – discussing the implications of the Brexit vote for the UK’s retail investment industry. Participants ranged from financial advisers to heads of sales at fund groups...