All about you

Having a life that spans countries, currencies and tax regimes can be challenging.  

The purpose of our Wealth Planning service is to help you:

- Get and keep the life/lifestyle you want.

- Answer fundamental life questions, such as ‘How much is enough?’ and ‘When can I afford to retire?’

- Avoid costly mistakes and stay on track.

 - Achieve and maintain financial independence and a comfortable lifestyle.

- Make sensible decisions about reducing the risks you’re exposed to.

- Make evidence-based decisions grounded upon academic science rather than speculation or emotion.

- Get a highly personalised service based on your individual needs.

- Follow a structured, clear, and engaging process - communicated in an understandable way.

- Free up your valuable time by removing the anxiety and burden of planning and managing your complicated financial affairs

- Feel truly cared for by a team focussed on you.

- Get clarity, confidence, and control over your ideal future.

All our clients have an international or cross-border aspect to their lives. 

Many are independent business owners and successful executives. They are retirees who like to travel and enjoy time with their family and pursuing their hobbies. They are also young professionals with bright futures ahead.

Our clients are typically financially independent or are on the road to financial independence.

They have a common thread knowing that their time is better spent on doing the things that they love doing.

They have achieved success in life by surrounding themselves with talented and intelligent individuals, and selecting a wealth planner is no different.

Peace of mind. Confidence. Time to focus on the things they love doing. Feeling connected and informed. Relief. Happiness. These are the feelings our clients tell us they experience when working with AES.  

They have loved ones to care for, charities to support, vacations to enjoy, and memories to be made. Worrying about their financial situation isn’t one of their goals…and it is probably not one of yours either.

Our approach, known as 'Lifestyle financial planning' is all about managing your resources – money and time – to get the most out of life.

Most people spend a lot of time working to make money without stopping to consider how their finances can be put to work to create the lifestyle they want. We’re here to change that. Our experts will help you use your money now to live life to the full while working with you to create a compelling vision for the future and a bespoke financial plan to bring it to life.

You first, money second.

We begin by asking you some big questions to help you start thinking about what you really want from life. Once we understand what makes life worthwhile to you, we will work with you to develop a clear picture of your financial future and, then we’ll help you put your money to work.

International financial planning is a professional approach to planning your financial future.  

It helps those who live overseas (expatriates), those with complex cross-border tax arrangements (non-doms), and those who own assets in multiple tax, legal and regulatory jurisdictions.

Based on your personal risks, aspirations and financial demands, a good financial planner will produce an effective road map to help you reach your desired financial destination, and meet the challenges of different life stages with peace of mind. 

They may cover your wealth accumulation phase, wealth preservation phase, income in retirement phase, inheritance tax and succession planning stages.

The best offshore financial advice helps point out the risks, the returns and the flexibility of your options within a marketplace where many regulatory and legal protections may not apply.

The best international financial advisers recommend which path to take so that you can grow your money through solid investment choices, but still have enough cash and flexibility for expenditure.

We believe good international financial planning is entirely different to the pure investment brokerage offered by traditional advisers.  

It typically includes:

• offshore banking
• cashflow planning;
• retirement and pension planning;
• estate planning and wealth protection; and
• tax and trust planning. 

It's hard to articulate all the benefits of a trusted Financial Planner.

Some can be purely captured in monetary terms. Yet many benefits are intangible, such as peace of mind and contentment from knowing that your finances are taken care of and you can get on with living your life. 

Specifically, the true value of a financial adviser is in crafting the future life you want into a plan and creating an investment policy appropriate to your most cherished goals (perhaps 20% of the value proposition). Behavioural investment counsel and coaching during stressful market episodes, be they terrifying or ecstatic (the other 80%).

As virtually no household/family is capable of these achievements, much less both, a good financial planners fee is a small fraction of their value to you.  Near great market turning points - this service is quite literally priceless.

Seven specific benefits from choosing our All About You service include:

1. You’ll get a highly tested, Personalised Financial Plan tailored to your values and goals.

2. You’ll get privileged access to an extraordinary Nobel prize-winning, evidence based investment strategy unavailable to ordinary investors.

3. You’ll experience the massive benefit of working with the only certified and proven fiduciary in Asia, the Middle East and Africa.

4. You’ll receive a high touch, individualised, team-orientated service to help keep you financially educated and comfortable.

5. You’ll work with a stable team at a large, independent, well established firm.

6. You’ll get a flexible, diversified, systematic investment process and your portfolio will typically be invested in global markets and adjusted as your investment objectives change.

7. Your fees are fair, and you’ll know what they are.

Our financial planning clients are expatriates, non-domiciled individuals, or those with other cross-border or offshore financial requirements who already have, or who are on their way to achieving £1,000,000 of investable assets.

Our process begins by taking an holistic approach to your financial life.

We then construct a blueprint for your financial plan, that becomes the basis of your relationship with our organisation. 

The process consists of several steps, culminating in a financial plan, paired with a recommended investment solution.

In our experience, clients who go through this process become investors who are better equipped to make educated decisions about their financial future.

We consider how to optimise clients’ pensions, investment platforms and portfolio approach, taking advantage of the opportunities offered to expatriates living in tax-free jurisdictions.

We bring high standards of discipline and expertise to complex matters that, if left untended, can become problems.

We employ UK-qualified financial advisers, including chartered wealth managers, chartered financial planners, retirement planning specialists and pension transfer specialists.  All are highly trained, qualified and experienced professionals.

The cost of their time, and the time taken for their planning process, means that the greatest value is added with our service for clients who already have, or who are on their way to achieving £1,000,000 of investable assets.

We do not sell products.  We offer clear, expert advice, cutting through the overwhelming mountain of financial information.  And we put plans in place for our clients to help them achieve their financial goals.

The plans we devise are unique, as no two clients have the same set of circumstances. However, our fundamental approach never changes: - 

1. We will get to know your financial circumstances well.
   
   
2. We will understand your attitude to wealth and to risk, your hopes and concerns for the future, and
   
   
3. We will make money an efficient, effective tool for your journey.

Not all financial advisers are the same.

Good financial advice relies on the professionals who give advice having relevant qualifications, experience and integrity.  This may sound obvious, but sadly in international financial services professionals like these are few and far between. 

An adviser you choose needs to operate within a corporate framework which provides a regulatory umbrella, compliance supervision, good management, systems and controls, all of which operate towards treating clients fairly.

In our view, the culture and values of a company inform the type of advice and service you are likely to receive. 

We strongly recommend that you run through this due diligence checklist on how to choose a financial adviser before committing to using us, or any of our competitors.

An all too common way of choosing a financial adviser is via personal recommendation – but this is not a good way. 

Poorly advised people are often unaware they have received sub-optimal financial advice for many years, and may therefore make frequent referrals and recommendations to their friends.

Unfortunately, traditional financial salespeople make themselves much more visible than professional advisers!  The bad ones cold call you, turn up at your house, bump into you at the golf course or in the pub, meet you at/after work...

Ultimately, they are often very slick and effective product salespeople who will tell you what they know you want to hear about great returns and better performing funds, in order to sell inflexible, poorly performing and expensive solutions.

Professional financial advisers are highly unlikely to cold call you and often reveal the uncomfortable truth about your existing situation.  They will typically use data to illustrate your situation and support their assertions with evidence.  They are often busy solving complex issues and are more likely to receive introductions as a result of their professional reputation and accreditation. 

Your best bet is do your own research, and use a tool such as this due diligence checklist for choosing a financial adviser.  You have only found a strong contender if they score 100%.

If you've already taken financial advice and want an expert analysis of your portfolio to ensure it’s correctly structured and aligned with your best interests, we can offer a Second Opinion.

We believe not everyone needs a financial adviser – at least not all of the time – but there is no one who wouldn’t benefit from good financial advice!

Professional financial planning incurs professional, transparent fees, (just like those of a chartered accountant, architect or lawyer). 

Good advice will be far less expensive than making the mistakes associated with ‘free’ advice and should always add easily demonstrable value.

However, the cost of these fees needs to be weighed against the benefit the advice will bring. 

If your needs are simple or investments more modest, our view is that it is often better to just get a helping hand to ensure you invest sensibly without the initial or ongoing cost of full financial advice.  

This fact isn't what the traditional industry wants you to know because an archaic mechanism, known as 'indemnified commission', enables traditional salespeople to make several decades worth of fees from you on the very first day you incept a product through them!  

This hidden payment creates a lack of flexibility for you, as it results in exit penalties and surrender values, at the same time as eroding your future returns and creating a conflict of interest. 

Traditionally, indemnity commission enables a financial salesperson to extract anything between 7 and 12% of your investment on the first day you hand over the money.  This is the reason salespeople will target new expats and less-well informed investors who otherwise could access cheaper and more flexible platforms for investment.

This conflict means you are likely to receive very little on-going service unless you allow your funds to be churned, you have more money to invest or you provide a stream of referrals.  After all, if you were paid for 25 years upfront - there would be little motivation to continue working without any further payment!

We suggest that clients with under £500,000 of assets strongly consider self-directed solutions, like the Smart Account™, to ensure they keep costs low, flexibility high, and maximise their returns during this wealth accumulation phase of life.

Great question!  But first, let us explain why you shouldn't hire us.

If you’re looking for an advisor who will trade stocks to “beat the market,” you’re in the wrong place. Why? Because we only focus on what you can control. Predicting if the stock market will go up or down, or guessing what interest rates will do next, are not things you can control.

But if you’re interested in things like optimising your finances, investing smarter, and creating a reliable income stream in retirement, you’re in the right place.

AES are known for addressing a broken financial system and completely turning it on its head. This means you get a breakthrough financial planning-led service supported by access to an institutional investment service.

AES UK was the first firm within the international marketplace to gain Corporate Chartered Financial Planner status and is the only firm in the AMEA region to be independently verified and certified as a fiduciary. This gives you peace of mind and security to know you will benefit from high
professional standards.

Co-CEO Sam Instone has been recognised by Sir Richard Branson, Ernst & Young, Barclays and The Economist as a financial leader. He
regularly features on TV as well as on radio and in press columns.

For your additional comfort and security, accounts are held at well-known, secure institutions specialising in asset custody, and your portfolio is accessible to you at any time.

You have virtually every aspect of the investment process managed for you, including account setup, asset allocation, re balancing and individual transactions.

You also benefit from the AES Satisfaction Guarantee.