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List of institutional investors in the United Kingdom

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

This is a list of institutional investors in the United Kingdom. Institutional investors manage other people's money by buying shares in companies, corporate bonds, gilts (i.e. government debt), commodities, foreign currencies, or combinations of each, or derivatives of them (i.e. options to buy, or other similar financial contracts. The main kinds of UK institutional investors are,

  • pension funds (where beneficiaries are saving for retirement)
  • insurance companies (where policyholders are insuring against risk, most importantly life insurance: effectively also a pension)
  • mutual funds (including investment companies, investment trusts, or unit trusts, where people are saving surplus wealth for any purpose)
  • sovereign wealth funds (government funds, often for saving wealth generated by natural resources)

Sovereign wealth funds are a recent addition, and grew following the Asian financial crisis from 1997, becoming important investors in the London Stock Exchange. Fund managers (usually known as investment advisers in the US), who typically belong to the same organisations as those running large mutual funds, play a critical role because normally the "primary" institutional investors delegate investment choices and corporate governance decisions to the fund manager. UK banks do not traditionally play an important role as institutional investors, as they do for instance in Germany.

The Institutional Investor Committee represents the interests of the NAPF, ABI, IMA, AITC and the British Merchant Banking and Securities House Association.

Mutual funds

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Representing the mutual fund and fund management industry is primarily the Investment Management Association (established in 2002, merging the Institutional Fund Managers Association and the Association of Unit Trusts and Investment Funds). The Association of Investment Companies is also a representation body, with an overlapping membership, but includes only businesses dealing in closed end investment companies.

These are the largest fund managers according to billions of pounds of assets under management.

Name est. AUM £bn Description Website
Legal & General 1836 25,223 British multinational financial services company based in London. lgim.com
UBS Global Asset Management 1862 12,353 Investment branch of UBS AG, a Swiss global financial services company. ubs.com
BlackRock 1988 10,142 US firm, and world's largest asset manager, formed by Larry Fink and Robert S. Kapito who previously worked at First Boston. blackrock.com
Baillie Gifford 1907 9,439 British multinational asset management company based in Edinburgh, Scotland. bailliegifford.com
Schroders 1804 6,994 British multinational asset management company. schroders.com
State Street Global Advisors 1978 4,806 Founded as part of the State Street Corporation (est 1792), and the world's second largest asset manager. ssga.com
Newton Investment Management 4,696 newton.co.uk
Capital International 1931 4,099 US fund manager. capgroup.com
Aberdeen Asset Management 1983 3,628 Listed on the London Stock Exchange in 1991. abderdeen-asset.com
Standard Life Investments 1825 3,175 Demutualised and listed on the London Stock Exchange in 2006. www.standardlife.com
Allianz Global Investors 1998 A part of Allianz SE, German financial services company. www.allianzgi.com
Investec Bank 1974 An international specialist banking and asset management group founded in Johannesburg. investec.com
Threadneedle Asset Management Acquired by Ameriprise Financial in 2003. columbiathreadneedle.co.uk
Henderson Global Investors 1934 Has merged with Janus Capital Group in 2017 to create Janus Henderson. .com
T Rowe Price 1937 troweprice.com
Fidelity International 1969 Operates as a private business since 1980, it provides investment management services. fidelityinternational.com
M&G Investments 1931 Was an autonomous business within the Prudential Group. Became a public company in 2019. mandg.com
Barclays Wealth .com
Invesco Perpetual 1973 Forms part of Invesco Ltd. invescoperpetual.co.uk

Pension funds

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The Association of Member Nominated Trustees and the National Association of Pension Funds are the umbrella bodies representing the interests of pension funds collectively. The number of pension funds largely mirrors the number of companies, as pensions have often not merged on an industry-wide basis.[1] Many pension funds for local councils fall within the umbrella group of the Local Government Pension Scheme, but as yet there is no consolidated management.

Name est. AUM £bn Description Website
BT Pension Scheme 39.6 [1]
Universities Superannuation Scheme 38.6 [2]
Royal Mail Pension Plan 12.4 [3]
Electricity Supply Pension Scheme [4]
Mineworkers Pension Scheme [5]
RBS Group Pension Fund [6]
Railways Pension Scheme [7]
Barclays Bank UK Retirement Fund [8]
BP Pension Fund [9]
National Grid UK Pension Scheme [10]
British Coal Staff Superannuation Scheme [11]
Shell Contributory Pension Fund [12]
Greater Manchester Pension Fund 12.6 [13]
Strathclyde Pension Fund [14]
British Steel Pension Scheme [15]
Lloyds TSB Group Pension Scheme [16]
BBC Pension Trust [17]
West Midlands Pension Fund [18]
HBOS Final Salary Pension Scheme [19]
GSK Pension Schemes .com
ICI Pension Fund [20]
Rolls-Royce Pension Fund .com
BA New Airways Pension Scheme .com
BAE Systems Pension Scheme .com
West Yorkshire Pension Scheme .com
British Airways Pension Scheme [21]
HSBC Bank UK Pension Scheme .com
Aviva Staff Pension Scheme .com
Co-operative Group Pension Scheme (Pace) [22]

Insurance companies

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The Association of British Insurers is the umbrella body for UK insurance companies.

Name est. AUM £bn Description Website
Legal & General .com
Aviva .com
Prudential .com
Old Mutual .com
Standard Life .com
Resolution .com
Phoenix .com
AEGON UK .com
XL Group .com
St. James's Place plc 1991 153.62 .com
RSA Insurance Group .com
QBE Insurance .com
Direct Line Insurance .com
NFU Mutual .com
FM Global .com
AXA .com
Royal London Asset Management 1988 159 .com
Allianz SE 1890 .com
Friends Life 2008 Defunct. Acquired by Aviva in 2015. .com
Zurich Insurance 1872 .com
Royal London Group 1861 159 .com
Hiscox 1901 .com
Lloyds Banking Group 2009 173 .com

See also

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Notes

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  1. ^ See the 2010 list by the advisory firm Lucia Archived 2011-09-19 at the Wayback Machine.