Brewin Dolphin got whacked yesterday, its shares down by 11 per cent, yet on the face of it, there was not much in the wealth manager’s first-half results to explain the sell-off.
Under David Nicol, its chief executive, the company is reaping the rewards of its greater focus on discretionary wealth management and a more disciplined attitude to costs. There was further progress in fattening up the profit margin, which improved again to 22.3 per cent, from 20.8 per cent in the previous half, not far shy now of Mr Nicol’s 25 per cent goal. Discretionary assets under management grew by 6 per cent, with outflows of £600 million from defecting clients more than offset by £1.1 billion of new money.
However, in private meetings