Expert financial services, tailored to your sector

Asset and wealth managers are facing a continual era of change and transformation; whether it be from regulation, customer demands and/or technological pressures amongst other factors.

At Azets we are dedicated to assisting our clients navigate these challenges, offering an outside lens so you can have confidence in your operation and focus on what you do best.

Our varied client base includes, but is not exclusive to, fund managers, private equity and IFAs.

Our specialist teams can support you in a variety of services, including:

• Completion or review of the regulatory returns
• CASS assurance reports
• External financial statements audit
• Capital adequacy advisory support
• Tax advisory
• Cyber Security and Data Privacy services
• Due diligence and transaction support
• Ad hoc advisory support on the application of MIFIDPRU

In recent years the payment services and E-money issuer sectors have developed rapidly in the UK, and the FCA currently considers this to be a priority area.

Regulatory focus led to the introduction in 2020 of the requirement for an annual audit of compliance with the safeguarding requirements for those Payment Services Firms (“PSR”) and E-Money Institutions (“EMI”) which are required to have a statutory audit of their financial statements. In 2023 the FCA issued a Dear CE letter to PSR and EMI firms detailing three outcomes set for FCA payments firs. In addition to safeguarding relevant customer funds, the second focussed on AML and fraud risk to ensure that financial system integrity is not compromised and the third on meeting customers’ needs through high quality products and services, competition and innovation, and robust implementation of the FCA Consumer Duty. More recently, the FCA has consulted on changes to the safeguarding rules to align requirements more closely with the Client Assets Sourcebook (“CASS”) rules.

Azets specialist financial services sector team has acted for both PSR and EMI firms for several years, providing a range of services including:

• External financial statements audit
• Safeguarding audit
• Accounts preparation and related advisory
• Outsourced accounting and outsourced payroll
• Tax compliance
• Advisory services

Please contact us to discuss your requirements and to establish how we can support you and your business.

The Fintech sector has seen significant growth over the years. At Azets we work with a wide range of financial service sector businesses that innovate and integrate technology into their operations. From start-ups to established businesses, we provide practical support and a range of services including:

• External financial statements audit
• Tax compliance, VAT and tax advisory
• Forecasting
• Advisory services

Please do not hesitate to reach out to our Financial Services teams to discuss your requirements and to establish how we might assist you and your business.

Our client base in the fund audit sector is focused on fund managers who use the Authorised Corporate Director (ACD) model. These are UK based investment funds who largely invest in UK and overseas equities either as:

• an authorised unit trust; or
• investment company under the Open Ended Investment Company (OEIC) Regulations 2001.

The Azets audit team have a wide range of experience auditing a variety of funds from large growth funds, with funds under management in excess of £750 million, to smaller High Net Worth family office funds, with sector specific/risk focused investment strategies.

As auditor of a fund, we are appointed by the Authorised Corporate Directors (ACD) who are legally responsible for the day-to-day management of the fund and ensuring that the fund is managed within applicable regulations.

With most UK funds, the ACD delegates a number of its functions by appointing financial professionals including depositary’s, custodians and investment managers. Our experienced audit team are used to working with all of these financial professionals during the audit process to ensure the audit is run efficiently and completed within the agreed timeframe.

Our client base includes brokers and MGAs, and ancillary businesses, from claims handlers to other providers to the insurance industry.

The sector is seeing significant change, particularly consolidation with a number of businesses expanding operations, to niche start-ups, that are looking to use technology to support development and drive business profitability.

At Azets, our specialist teams support our broking clients with a range of services, including:

• CASS assurance reporting
• RMAR support
• External financial statements audit, where applicable
• Client money reviews
• Compliance with relevant regulations
• Outsourced accounting and outsourced payroll
• Tax advisory and compliance

In addition to the above, our corporate finance team, undertake due diligence and advisory with the purchase of insurance brokers or books of business and support clients through sales mandate processes. Equally, having the right people in your business is clearly critical, and our dedicated HR team and tax advisory teams frequently support businesses with staff retention matters.

Securites dealers and brokers are subject to various regulations and restrictions that encompass capital requirements, risk management rules such as keeping proper records, implementing strong internal controls and reporting to the FCA.

The regulatory landscape is ever evolving and having experienced advisers with hands on experience of dealing with such complexities including strong industry knowledge makes a difference to navigate these choppy waters.

At Azets, our seasoned financial services team are well equipped to understand your business model and the challenges revolving around income recognition. Our collaborative approach ensures that we work in partnership on the areas that are important to your business.

Our team members can support proprietary trading firms on compliance matters, including:

• Completion or review of the regulatory returns
• CASS assurance reports
• Statutory audit
• Capital adequacy advisory support
• Ad hoc advisory support on the application of MIFIDPRU

The lending sector is a broad one and we work with a number of lending institutions, including asset finance providers, vehicle finance firms and mutual organisations.

The sector faces ongoing economic and regulatory pressures as well as significant change due to new technologies and new entrants to the market challenging longer standing firms. We work with both new entrants and longer standing players to support them in this ever-changing market.

Our nationwide team of specialists provide a range of services to our lending clients including statutory audit, accounts preparation and tax advisory and compliance work.