Standard Life plc announces that Standard Life Wealth ("SLW"), one of the UK's fastest growing discretionary fund management businesses¹, has entered into an agreement with Newton Management Limited to acquire its private client division with assets under management of £3.6bn.The consideration of up to £83.5m will be ultimately contingent on the value of assets under management transferred to, and retained by, SLW. The acquisition is anticipated to be accretive to earnings in the first full year following completion.

The transaction is expected to more than triple SLW's discretionary assets, creating a private client wealth manager in the UK with increased profitability, significant scale and market presence.

It represents a rare opportunity to acquire a high quality book of business, as well as a skilled and dedicated client-facing workforce, without any legacy operations or systems.

This accelerates Standard Life's ambitions in the retail investment market, while balancing the strength of Standard Life Investments in the institutional and wholesale markets, and supporting further growth in fee-based business.

Newton's Private Client business has approximately 3,000 UK and international High Net Worth, Ultra High Net Worth and a number of charity clients², and has strong distribution links with accountants and solicitors. Its distinctive, long-only investment proposition complements SLW's volatility-managed, target-return solution, broadening SLW's investment capability and giving clients more choice of investment styles to meet their goals. The combined business will leverage a pooled distribution capability across professional advisers, the charity sector and Standard Life's extensive IFA network. All 79 directly-employed Newton Private Clients staff will transfer to Standard Life.

Richard Charnock, Chief Executive, Standard Life Wealth, said: "This acquisition complements SLW's impressive growth to date and provides us with a unique opportunity to accelerate our onshore and offshore strategy. We are bringing together additional skills, clients and assets to create a discretionary wealth manager of significant scale and market presence."

Caroline Tye, Head of Private Clients at Newton, said: "We are delighted to be joining such a highly regarded discretionary investment management business and are excited by the opportunities that it presents both for our clients and for the team. Standard Life Wealth places private clients at the core of its investment offering, enabling us to maintain our long tradition of tailored portfolio management focused on our clients' individual needs and aspirations."

The transaction is expected to complete within 7 months subject to completion conditions being satisfied, including receipt of applicable regulatory approvals.

Ends

Standard Life contact details:

Institutional Equity Investors
Lorraine Rees - 0207 872 4124 / 07738 300 878
Jakub Rosochowski - 0131 245 8028 / 07515 298 608

Media
Claire Burston - 0131 245 5078/ 07738 301 004

Notes to editors

1. Source: Private Asset Management Awards 2012

2. The agreement includes:

• £3.6bn of Newton's AUM, of which
  • £3.2bn is from approximately 3,000 private clients, representing about 1,250 private client groups. This consists of all UK (£2.5bn AUM) and international (£0.7bn AUM) private client arrangements managed from Newton Private Clients' London, Leeds and Edinburgh offices
  • £0.4bn represents charity assets managed on behalf of about 120 charities. This includes all charity relationships managed by the Edinburgh and Leeds offices, and those charity clients that are directly connected to private clients looked after by the London-based private client managers
• The entities Newton International Investment Management Limited and Newton Fund Managers (C.I.) Limited
• The transfer of the investment management of certain FSA-regulated and JFSC-regulated Collective Investment Schemes
  • UK: Newton Balanced Bridge Fund, Newton Bridge Fund, Newton Falcon Fund, Newton Phoenix Fund, Newton Acer Fund, Norfolk Trust, Notts Trust, Newton Merlin Fund, Newton Capital Strategy Fund, Newton Securities Fund and Newton Ilex Fund.
  • International: The Newton Offshore Strategy Fund range operated by Newton Fund Managers C.I. Limited including all 7 sub funds: Global Equity, UK Equity, Bridge, Diversified Assets, Global Balanced, Global Fixed Interest and Sterling Interest
• 79 employees

Fenchurch Advisory Partners acted as exclusive financial adviser to Standard Life plc.

Standard Life Wealth is an investment management service and a subsidiary of Standard Life plc.

SLW offers personal investment management services for private individuals using a goal-based investment approach. The SLW full discretionary service is available to clients with over £500k to invest. The SLW Managed Portfolio Service is available to clients with £100k to invest. While SLW draws on Standard Life group’s knowledge and experience, investments are selected from across the whole of the market.

For further details please go to: www.standardlifewealth.com