Private equity firm Permira is looking to sell its £1.5bn majority stake in Evelyn Partners.
According to a report in The Sunday Times the wealth and accountancy group is now on the market, as its owner is seeking external help to sell the business.
The sale by Permira, which owns about 56% of the business, could even take the form of a break-up, with Evelyn’s accountancy business separated out from the firm, it added.
Permira acquired a stake in what eventually became Evelyn Partners in 2014 by purchasing the online investment platform Bestinvest and merging it with competitor Tilney.
Warburg Pincus joined as an investor in 2020, supplying capital for the merger between Tilney and the accountancy firm Smith & Williamson. In 2022, the firm merged its Tilney and Smith & Williamson brands into one, and was renamed as Evelyn Partners.
Evelyn Partners saw assets under management and administration grow to a record high of £61.8bn in the first quarter of the year.
In a trading update on 14 May, the company said this represented an increase of 4.6% on the previous quarter, when AUMA sat at £59.1bn, and an increase of 13.6% on Q1 2023.
The rise was attributed to a number of other positive developments, such as an increase in gross inflows.
Gross inflows for the first quarter of the year totalled £1.8bn, an increase of 5.9% on the final quarter of 2023.
