My story

I first approached Paul around 15 years ago when he was working for a large financial planning firm, because I wanted some help managing my financial affairs. I wanted someone who could give me the best advice.

At the time, I was working as an investment banker – a stockbroker, which was almost a 24/7 job especially as I was running a global team of people doing advisory work in the mining sector. I was in my early 40s and very busy with my family and career and hence really too busy to run my financial future myself. Although actually, I didn’t really want to run it myself and wanted an independent view on the best options for investing my money – pensions, ISAs, trusts, my tax position and structure. I wanted to try and get an unbiassed view of the whole picture regarding what was best for my future.

As an investment banker you have a view of parts of the market, but I couldn’t necessarily see the whole market, especially as my main focus was on the mining sector and commodities. I really wanted a view on other sectors such as tech, bonds and UK property to make sure I had a balanced portfolio slanted to sectors that I thought might do well. My mantra in life is always to seek the best advice, especially when it comes to personal finance.

Over many years Paul has proved be extremely diligent in giving me updates on my investments, for example, if one fund is underperforming and he thinks I should switch. He’s really good at that and  I’m absolutely delighted at the performance of the investments he’s suggested. The most important thing to me is the service level – which is outstanding – but it is also important that Paul and his team are extremely personable and that the reports they produce are professional but easy to understand. For a busy person who needs to make decisions on altering a portfolio,  the options are always clear and presented really well.

Paul has become a trusted advisor – and investing is all about trust. He’s never abused that trust. When I’ve needed a mortgage or insurance, Paul has always helped me find the right person and that’s really, really valuable.

The work that I’ve done with Paul has included advice on structuring a fund to pay for school fees and this has proved massively helpful. And at the age of 57, I also now feel comfortable that I have a retirement pot so I don’t need to worry about, should I decide to retire – despite this seeming very unlikely given the excitement around my company right now! Having the financial part of my life squared away gave me the confidence I needed to start my own company, which I did in 2016. I now run my own mining exploration and development company which seeks to develop a domestic supply of lithium for the UK electric vehicle and battery supply chain. To be honest I wouldn’t have had the confidence that I have the money, or the bandwidth to take this step at this stage in my life otherwise.