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Abrdn snaps up Interactive Investor in £1.5bn deal
Abrdn is continuing its hunt for fintech acquisitions as it looks to digitise it business.
Asset management giant Abrdn's has full acquired online investment platform Interactive Investor in a £1.5bn deal.
Formerly known as Standard Life Aberdeen, Abrdn’s purchase of the UK’s second-largest D2C brokerage forms part of its hunt for fintech acquisitions.
Abrdn said it was acquiring a fast-growing business that had over 400,000 clients and £55bn assets under administration as of June 2021.
By acquiring the stock-picking platform, Abrdn is making a significant move into the growing self-investment sector.
It will be competing against the likes of London-listed Hargreaves Lansdown and AJ Bell.
Online investing controlled by retail investors, rather than fund managers, has become more mainstream in recent times, thanks to easy to use apps and web platforms.
Abrdn is buying the business from the majority shareholder, JC Flowers, a US private equity firm, which controlled Interactive Investor via a holding company, Antler Holdco, registered in Guernsey.
Stephen Bird, CEO, Abrdn, said: “ interactive investor is the UK’s number one subscription-based investing platform with a powerful reputation as a consumer champion. abrdn’s scale, resources, and shared vision will enable Interactive Investor to grow confidently and expand its leadership position in the UK’s attractive savings and wealth market."
Richard Wilson, CEO, interactive investor, said: "We will have access to abrdn’s additional capabilities across research, advice and wealth management services, and we will benefit from being part of one of Europe’s largest investment and wealth management firms, with a vision and values closely aligned to our own.”
Interactive Investors (which Augmentum Fintech is an investor in) will continue to operate independently within Abrdn and will continue to be run by Wilson.
Abrdn recently swooped on Finimize and struck a deal to buy Exo Investing from Nucoro earlier this year.
Abrdn, which manages or administers £450bn of assets for various clients, was founded in the mid 1980s by, among others, Revolut's chairman Marin Gllbert.
Under new CEO Bird, who has been in the job for just a year, Abrdn is clearly looking to fintech companies to speed up its digitalisation journey via acquisitions.
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