Member Article

Successful buy-out strategy key to impressive financials for Boldon’s Fairstone Group

Boldon-headquartered finance company Fairstone Group has announced a strong set of financial results, including a 152% growth in recurring income, for the year ended 31 December 2014.

The business, which reported a 29% increase in revenues to £17.4m, also revealed that operational results for 2015 already ahead of forecast.

The firm said its continued growth was largely achieved by significant traction in its Downstream Buy Out (DBO) programme, with a series of deals with partner firms completed at various stages within the reported 2014 financial year.

Commenting, Chief Executive Lee Hartley said: “I am delighted to announce that the Fairstone Group continues to make excellent progress against our core strategy and growth plan. We remain absolutely focused on our buy-out strategy and we continue to believe that successful consolidation is driven by dealing with integration ahead of the acquisition.

“We are committed to working with high-quality firms that want to drive their performance upwards over the coming years and, by doing so, realise optimum value for their business. We are already ahead of our forecasts for 2015 and interest in our DBO proposition has never been higher, with a very significant series of deals at various stages of maturity.”

The results have been published at a time of positive developments at the firm, which has seen it undertake a successful brand consolidation exercise over the last 12 months, resulting in the Fairstone brand being applied across all parts of the group.

Further enhancing its standing within the Financial Services sector, Fairstone recently achieved Corporate Chartered Status from the Chartered Insurance Institute, making it one of the largest Chartered financial planning firms in the UK. The firm has also launched its own Academy to fully support advisers within the group to achieve Chartered Financial Planner status.

Lee concluded: “The last financial year has been a successful one and we’re looking ahead to a very exciting future for Fairstone.”