SLAB: Standard Life and Aberdeen get it on
I don’t know how your weekend was, but I suspect it was more fun than the lawyers, bean counters and PR people at Aberdeen and Standard Life had. Out of the blue, the news was broken by @MarkKleinmanSky around lunchtime Saturday, and from there things have moved rapidly to the point of the merger recommendation […]
What’s 0.04% amongst friends? Standard Life hikes Elevate prices; causes eyebrow raising in Leith.
I’ve always liked folk who buck trends. Counter culture is my favourite kind of culture. So you’d think I’d be supportive of Standard Life’s decision to buck the downward trend of platform pricing by increasing Elevate’s charges. And in some ways I am. In others, though, I’m not, and I’ll tell you for why. It’s […]
What’s 0.04% amongst friends? Standard Life hikes Elevate prices; causes eyebrow raising in Leith.
I’ve always liked folk who buck trends. Counter culture is my favourite kind of culture. So you’d think I’d be supportive of Standard Life’s decision to buck the downward trend of platform pricing by increasing Elevate’s charges. And in some ways I am. In others, though, I’m not, and I’ll tell you for why. It’s […]
And so it begins – Standard Life scarfs AXA Elevate
(I made edits to this at 7.30pm on 4/5/16 to update on the Architas deal, pricing reviews and the purchase price). Well, I was never going to be able to let this go by. I was on a plane as I wrote most of this; the news of Standard Life buying AXA Portfolio Services, which […]
Tiers for fears – Standard Life comes out of the shadows
Note:Hidden craftily throughout this blog are song titles by Tears for Fears. Anyone who gets them all wins a free copy of the lang cat Guide to Platform Pricing, along with regular updates for stuff like this. Enter via the comments form below. Standard Life is the last platform to reveal its post-RDR charging structure. […]
Bangs and whimpers – the SUPERCLEAN starting gun is fired
Those who know me will be surprised by the following statement: I feel a bit sorry for Standard Life today. OK, as you were. This blog isn’t really about SL. It’s about SUPERCLEAN and it just so happens that SL is first to the party. The Edinburgh titan’s superclean announcement has generated a resounding ‘meh’ […]
The meek geek week shall inherit the earth. With advertising.
So that’s been quite a week in Platformland then. Most importantly, some bunch of Scots jokers published something and did a load of twitter awards nonsense. If you want to read about it go here and you should be able to sort of follow it. It was fun, and thanks to those of you who […]
SUPERCLEAN – sorts stubborn semi-bundled stains!
So things move on apace in the clean share class / rebate war, and the industry continues to eat its young with gay abandon. The latest development to shine in is from everyone’s favourite consumer champion, Standard Life, who today announced it’s going to launch a whizzo range of SUPERCLEANÂ funds onto SL Wrap. SUPERCLEANÂ funds are […]
Fashionably late – Skandia joins the transparency gang
There was SIMPLY NO WAY that I’d be able to let this go by. What a day for Skandia, and what a triumph of news management. With UK inflows on SIS dropping 40% and a reminder in the analyst statements that only £20bn or so of the near £40bn it’s credited with having is on […]
Standard Life to the transparency diary room
<<EDIT – Since writing this SL has been in touch – hi, how you doing – to say that I got the charging structure wrong – the charge on the total pot changes at various trigger points rather than a set charge applying to each tranche. Very happy to amend – this stuff has to […]
