Walker Crips expects pre-acquisition losses to widen significantly

Troubled wealth manager Walker Crips has seen its losses more than quadruple after a “difficult” first half before being acquired by a firm. Singapore competitors.

The London-listed group reported a pre-tax loss of 7 million pounds in the six months to September 30, compared with a loss of 1.5 million pounds a year ago, and blamed its poor performance on “internal challenges and wider economic uncertainty”.

It suffered a £4.4m goodwill write-down, although revenue also fell 7.3% to £14.6m.

Just a month ago, the company agreed to a £5.6 million acquisition by Singapore’s Phillip Capital, which already holds about 29% of Walker Crips.

PhillipCapital made the offer at 14p a share after providing Walker Crips with a £5m emergency loan in July.

Walker Crips interim chairman Mark Nelligan said: “Given ongoing internal challenges and wider economic uncertainty, this is another difficult time for the Walker Crips group.

“It was against this backdrop that on November 24 the independent directors of Walker Crips Group recommended that Phillip Capital acquire the group.”

Walker Crips said another reason for the weak performance was increased regulation and rising costs associated with moving the custody, trading and settlement operations of its investment management unit to New York’s Pershing Bank.

The company said the operational transformation required “substantial employee and management attention, which impacted the ability to execute growth plans and therefore expected revenue for the period”.

Mr Nelligan added: “While the results are not promising, they are not entirely unexpected given the stage of transition we are in.

“We remain determined to turn around the situation through several ongoing initiatives, including enhanced cost management efforts, a comprehensive tariff review, new structured products initiatives including the Structured Products Fund, and ongoing process improvements.

“The company has identified a series of cost reduction measures that are expected to begin to bear fruit in 2026.”