Appointments

Oak has appointed Belinda Ridout as Director of Client Accounting, based in Guernsey. Belinda has spent the past 13 years with Aztec Group, latterly as an Associate Director, specialising in private equity across multiple complex fund structures. She has considerable expertise creating processes and procedures to improve delivery of services, as well as training team members and managing the onboarding of clients during fund migrations and launches. She has also served on numerous regulated general partner boards for venture capital and buy-out funds.

Hawk Group has hired Maria Tengdahl as Client Services and Lending Operations Manager and Compliance Administrator for Hawk Estates in Jersey. Maria has served as AMLi Manager for HSBC, covering the Channel Islands, Isle of Man, Hong Kong and UAE offices. For the past two years she has led the Government of Jersey’s Enforcement Team. In addition, Hawk Group has appointed Sean Le Chevalier as Client Services Manager for Hawk Brokering. Sean has more than five years’ experience in debt structuring at Close Finance CI, supporting sales teams and underwriting secured and unsecured lending applications for clients.

Nathan Petty has joined Praxis’ business development team in Jersey as Director, moving from his previous client role at the firm. Nathan brings to the new position 12 years of financial services experience working for high-net-worth and ultra-highnet-worth individuals and families. He has specialised in offshore structures including trusts, companies, foundations and limited partnerships. He joined Praxis in February, having spent eight years with fiduciary services provider Valla as a Director. Nathan spent his early career with First Names Group as a Business Development Manager. Collas Crill has appointed Victoria Grogan as Group Partner in its International Private Client and Trusts team in Jersey. Victoria spent the first 11 years of her career in wills and probate roles at Carey Olsen, before joining Ogier in 2017 as Counsel. She most recently served as Head of Wills and Probate at Ogier. Victoria advises on all aspects of Jersey wills, probate and mental capacity law for local and international clients and she also acts as professional executor, delegate and attorney. She has significant expertise in succession planning, will drafting and the administration of complex and cross-border estates.

IQ-EQ has appointed Jon Stevens as Head of Risk and Compliance in Jersey. Jon has more than 10 years’ experience in risk and compliance, most recently as Director of Policy at the Jersey Financial Services Commission. He started his career with KPMG and Deloitte as a chartered accountant and auditor, before holding various senior policy and managerial positions with the JFSC. In his new role, Jon will lead on the delivery of strategic targets in the risk and compliance function, as well as participating in risk and operations committees, identifying improvements in policies and procedures.

Jersey consultancy Switch Digital has appointed Lynne Capie as Co-owner and Director alongside MD Damon Eastwood. As a result, Switch has partnered with Soteria, a crisis management business focusing on cyber incidents, which Lynne launched in September. Lynne is a communications professional with experience in hospitality, local government, finance and legal sectors. She has spent six years with Appleby, latterly as a consultant but also Head of Operations in Jersey. Her career also included periods with RBS, including two years as Head of Communications for RBS International.

Tim Ringsdore, CEO of the Jersey Competition Regulatory Authority, has taken over as Chair of the Small Nations Regulators’ Forum for 2023. Tim became JCRA CEO in February 2021, having held the role in an interim capacity from June 2020, when the JCRA split from the Channel Islands Competition and Regulatory Authorities. He has worked in regulation, telecoms and television across the Channel Islands, London and British Virgin Islands, with a strong track record at board level. The SNRF was founded by the International Institute of Communications (IIC) to enable small jurisdictions to share knowledge.

HSBC has appointed Will Paine to the position of Chief Risk Officer in the Channel Islands and Isle of Man, overseeing HSBC’s risk framework across the islands. Will has 20 years’ experience with HSBC, having started his career working for the UK bank in a distribution role, before moving to Jersey in 2011 to run the Premier Wealth business on the island. Over the past seven years he has worked in a variety of risk-focused roles within HSBC’s Wealth and Personal Banking (WPB) and Commercial Banking business, most recently as Chief Control Officer in WPB for the Channel Islands and Isle of Man and Europe.

Highvern has added Kerrie Le Tissier to its Guernsey office as a Director. Kerrie is an Advocate with 18 years’ experience in law firms in Guernsey and Jersey, including Ogier, Bedell Cristin and Collas Crill. Most recently, she ran her own private wealth practice in Guernsey, KLT Legal, specialising in services for fiduciaries and high-net-worth clients. She has chaired the Guernsey Association of Trustees’ technical committee since July, having been a committee member for the past year. Kerrie has also worked for Australian law firm Mills Oakley and a family office in Switzerland. KPMG in the Crown Dependencies has appointed Rachelle Wilkes to the role of ESG Director, based in Guernsey. Rachelle has more than 15 years’ experience in science, technology and finance. She has spent the past five and a half years with HSBC, latterly as Product Governance and Sustainability Lead for HSBC Asset Management. Rachelle contributes to ESG education as a board member for the MBA programme at Durham University Business School and as a climate ambassador for MIT Sloan. She also has cross-sector experience as the business lead in state-wide projects across New South Wales in Australia.

Crestbridge has appointed Laura Parkes as a Director in its Family Office Services team, based in Jersey. Laura will lead on family office structures administered in Jersey for clients in the Americas, Canada and the UK. She will also support business development efforts in the Americas, including working with Crestbridge Fiduciary, the firm’s US joint venture with Willow Street. With more than 20 years’ experience in the private client trust sector, Laura joined Crestbridge after five years with Standard Bank Group, latterly as African Team Leader. Laura’s earlier career also included periods with Citi, HSBC and ABN Amro.

Hawksford has promoted Steve Spybey to Group Chief Operating Officer, Caroline Morris to Group Chief Financial Officer and Rachel Husbands to Finance Director for Jersey. Steve has been with the firm since 2014, latterly as Chief Finance Officer, having spent 11 years with EY. Caroline’s new role is an expansion of her previous one as Global Head of Finance. She joined Hawksford in 2012 after 13 years with Trustcorp (Jersey). Rachel joined Hawksford in 2019 as Head of Business Management. During her career she has also worked for Stonehage Fleming, Intertrust, Ogier and Coutts Offshore Europe.

Entrepreneurs and their succession the path to investing

Building a business succession or exit strategy can be one of an entrepreneur’s best investments – but in practice, traditional succession approaches can be complex. Stephen Coelho, Client Advisor at UBS Global Wealth Management in Jersey, considers some potentially overlooked aspects of executing a business succession, exit or winding up

IN THE SECOND quarter of 2022, a UBS Investor Watch survey found that 37% of investors were highly concerned about the value of the assets they’d pass on to future generations.

Succession and exit often depend not simply on business value, but also on financial wealth and its ability to support the lifestyles of the business’ founder and their family.

The current economic and market uncertainty – particularly in relation to the path for inflation – could be making entrepreneurs more concerned about their next steps.

However, despite the turbulence, today may still be an opportune time to begin or revise business succession and exit strategies, so that they align with the entrepreneur’s particular circumstances. Here we identify three dos and don’ts for entrepreneurs to consider and act upon for their business and private wealth:

1. DO INCLUDE SUSTAINABILITY AS PART OF THE AUCTION OR NEGOTIATIONS PROCESSES

Sustainability is an increasingly important topic for all stakeholders. This also applies to prospective buyers. However, traditional designs for an auction or negotiation process may not explicitly include sustainability criteria.

We are therefore experiencing growing scope for sustainability criteria to be included inside an entrepreneur’s value maximisation measures when working on a deal and its details.

The value maximisation process can be considered in terms of five parts: 1. Clear and consistent conditions around bidding 2. Robust information provisions 3. A comprehensive set of seller criteria 4. Creating a healthy competitive environment for potential suitors 5. Careful consideration of how the transaction will be structured. Sustainability and ESG transparency are also increasingly important for attracting capital and investors. Potential buyers may view a target company as a sustainability leader, one with scope for sustainability improvement, or as a firm well placed for ESG engagement as part of the process to increase value before a full exit.

When it comes to designing the optimal auction or negotiation process for a partial or full business exit, it may be worth including sustainability criteria or commitments as part of the bidding rules.

Businesses with a strong sustainability or social mission may find that longterm value maximisation arises from selecting a buyer who pays a reasonable price and commits to the firm’s ongoing sustainability efforts through purpose and capital commitments.

Sustainability will also likely matter for entrepreneurs in their information provision. If the investment case for buying a firm can be increased by outlining the target company’s sustainability credentials (or scope for improvement), adding robust, verifiable and outcome-focused sustainability data into management presentations and the data room may be worthwhile investments for entrepreneurs looking to sell.

2. DON’T THINK THE PATH FROM ENTREPRENEUR TO WEALTH MANAGER IS LINEAR – THINK IN SCENARIOS

Reports in the financial press about a private company’s initial public offering and the sudden jump in an entrepreneur’s paper net worth can provide a misleading impression about the transition from business owner to wealth manager or steward.

In reality, the transition is often not linear. Nor does it necessarily follow the best-made plans. One of the most important initial challenges for an entrepreneur exiting, transitioning to the next generation or even winding up their firm is how to manage near-term financial needs against long-term financial goals, such as saving for retirement or leaving a legacy to improve the lives of others.

Entrepreneurs often find it difficult to move their wealth from a business they control to external investments whose performance lies outside their control. This emotional challenge can be particularly acute in bear markets (defined as periods where the S&P 500 index of large-cap stocks falls more than 20% from its peak).

The idea of ‘volatile’ cash may seem odd, but cash is useful for meeting real (after-inflation) spending needs

3. DO CONSIDER MARKET VOLATILITY AS FRIEND AND FOE – INCLUDING WAYS TO MITIGATE AND MONETISE IT

Volatility of wealth is less of an entrepreneurial concern when holding a business. Few business owners undertake frequent market valuations. At execution of a business sale, transition or winding down, the volatility of financial market assets (including cash) can be an uncomfortable and new reality for entrepreneurs to face.

Prima facie, the idea of ‘volatile’ cash may seem odd. But cash is useful for meeting real (after-inflation) spending needs. And in today’s environment of high inflation around many parts of the world – and uncertainty around how quickly inflation will moderate toward central banks’ targets – holding excessive amounts of cash can mean more volatility in the level of real wealth, with the potential to introduce uncertainty around meeting financial goals.

Shielding financial portfolios from volatility – to maximise the chances of having money when one needs it – is a key entrepreneur consideration at a liquidity event. In our research paper Three ways to build financial resilience in an uncertain world, we discussed how portfolio diversification across multiple asset classes, sectors and geographies may help to smooth portfolio returns. But over recent months, the falls in both equities and fixed income have challenged many traditional asset allocation approaches. n

FURTHER INFORMATION

Whether you are looking for trusted advisors to guide a sale or succession conversation or to connect with peers who have already walked the path, contact Stephen Coelho for more information.

Stephen Coelho, Client Advisor, UBS Global Wealth Management in Jersey 1, IFC St Helier, Jersey JE2 3BX 01534 701134 stephen.coelho@ubs.com

You can also read the full report here: https://bit.ly/path_to_investing