What a difference a year makes

2024 has definitely been a year of change. A new government, a new tax landscape, and thankfully, a much-improved investment backdrop. They wouldn’t all quite have got onto our 2024 Christmas card list, but we’ll definitely take the last one!

This time last year we had just seen the light at the end of the inflation tunnel, and were starting to see the portfolios make progress as we entered the Christmas break. They haven’t looked back since really, with consistent returns delivered across our portfolio range in 2024.

At a company level there has been plenty of change too. We have completed the purchases of two businesses this year in Andy Roe Financial Services, and RJB Financial. There has been a lot of work behind the scenes to integrate and align, though overall we are delighted with the progress made and are excited to broaden our offering to more clients over the months and years ahead. In addition, 2024 has been a record year for new clients coming to us for planning advice, and has kept our team very busy. Staff recruitment is certainly on our agenda at the moment!

Talking of staff, our team numbers have increased slightly over the year from 52 to 55 across the year, which is the highest level in our history. Despite now operating at a larger scale, we remain fully determined to continue to deliver a personalised, family-office service to all our clients.

To that end we plan to alter our fee structure in 2025. We have used our larger scale to negotiate some of the best platform terms available in the industry, which in turn will allow us to increase our own charges with no overall increase to clients. The additional revenue generated can then be reinvested in our team and infrastructure, to ensure we remain better positioned than we have ever been to deliver our clients objectives. This is a strategy we have employed over the last decade, with our client fees on average reducing by 25% over that timeline.

So, it’s been a busy year at business level, and in addition, we have seen significant changes to personal and corporate taxation from the budget that will have planning consequences for clients over the years ahead. Our team are already working hard in preparation for next year’s reviews, looking at the most effective planning solutions to help ensure clients are best positioned to maximise efficiency, whilst continuing to deliver the desired outcomes. So watch this space in that regard.

As ever the challenge for 2025 is finding the right balance to your planning, keeping your investments and tax levels as efficient as they can be given individual circumstances.  From a portfolio perspective we will provide more detail on our outlook for next year in our first blog on 10^th January, but for now it has been good to see another positive year of returns, to back up the progress made in 2023. The amount of funds managed under our advice has now grown to over £1.1 billion, which I hope is testimony to the hard work and trusted relationships we share with our clients.

Finally, just a nod to the charity work we have completed this year, which has taken a lot of effort from many faces behind the scenes. In total we have raised £11,410 for the local charity The Children’s Bereavement Centre through a number of events and initiatives.

As always, we wouldn’t be anywhere without our clients, who it is a privilege to work for. I speak on behalf of the whole team at DB Wood when I say we wish you a happy and healthy 2025 and look forward to speaking to you over the course of next year.