A look back at the most popular stories to feature on eprivateclient this week...
Monday
Law firm Jurit merged with Surrey-based wealth management and private client law firm, PWT Advice LLP. Nicola Dudley and Jo Summers, both previously with PWT Advice, joined Jurit LLP as partners. A team of consultants also made the move from PWT Advice and are now members of the Jurit team.
US courts ended Britney Spears’ conservatorship after more than 13 years. During this period, many aspects of the pop star’s finances and personal life had been controlled by her father – Jamie Spears. The conservatorship was set up in 2008, after the Oops I Did It Again! singer faced a public mental health crisis.
Tuesday
Nearly one percent of all registered property titles are registered to individuals with an overseas correspondence address. According to research by the Centre for Public Data (CFPD), 247,016 titles across England & Wales are held by overseas individuals. This has more than doubled since 2010, when such individuals owned around 0.4 percent of titles.
London law firm Farrer & Co announced its back to work policy which sees the entire firm returning to its newly refurbished office in Lincoln’s Inn Fields for at least 40 percent of the week. From the 1 November, the London-based law firm began implementing a new agile working framework which the firm said aims to ensure that all employees can have a balance of opportunities both working in the new office and from home.
Wednesday
Law firm Shakespeare Martineau added new partner and former eprivateclient Top 35 under 35 Iwan Williams to its private client team, specialising in tax and succession. With more than 11 years’ experience, Mr Williams returned to Shakespeare Martineau from Charles Russell Speechlys after spending more than seven years in the latter's private wealth team.
Global fiduciary services provider IQ-EQ acquired Greyline Partners, a US provider of governance and regulatory compliance solutions for private equity, venture capital, hedge funds and investors. Founded in 2016, Greyline is a partner led compliance services business headed up by managing partner, Matt Okolita, employing 56 people across its six offices located in San Francisco, Dallas, New York, Chicago, Boston and London.
Thursday
International law firm Mishcon de Reya grew its offering to investors to cover a diverse range of investment strategies and markets, with the appointment of Angeli Arora as a partner. Ms Arora’s former roles include regional leader of private equity (Africa) at Dentons and corporate partner at Akin Gump (including establishing Akin’s Hong Kong office to support key fund clients).
A report from the National Audit Office (NAO) on managing tax debt through the pandemic showed there is still £42 billion of tax debt owed to HMRC as of 30 September 2021. There are also now more than two million taxpayers in debt as at 30 September 2021 compared with 31 January 2020. HMRC estimated it could collect £1.2 billion of additional tax debt each year between 2021-22 and 2023-24 with planned increases in staff numbers and use of private sector partners.
Friday
UK accountancy and wealth managemnt firm Old Mill announced plans to target 15 percent growth every year in a five-year plan, appointing new chief executive Kevin Whitmarsh to execute it. Mr Whitmarsh was most recently head of accountancy at Old Mill, and has been with the firm since 1995.
Research by property portal MoveStreets revealed how much more homebuyers are willing to pay for a 'Home Alone' house in the current market. With a new Home Alone movie now streaming on Disney+, MoveStreets analysed the asking price of Georgian style homes currently on the market across 15 major cities and found that a house like that will set you back on average £727,903 on the current market.