St James’s Place has continued its shakeup of senior staff with a new chief risk officer as Britain’s biggest wealth manager works to rebuild credibility.
Chief risk officer Mark Sutton, who had worked at the firm for the last seven years, represents the third executive to depart in just over a year.
A St James’s Place spokesperson said Sutton “has been a key part of building the central risk and compliance functions”.
He is set to be replaced by Hestie Reinecke, who joined the business in October. Reinecke was most recently chief compliance officer at Prudential.
“Hestie has extensive risk management experience in financial services and has led risk, compliance and control functions at Barclays and Prudential,” said a St James’s Place spokesperson.
Last October, the wealth manager’s CEO Andrew Croft stepped down, leaving new CEO Mark Fitzpatrick to take his place.
New chief investment officer Justin Onuekwusi also joined the business in October, pledging a “number of changes” to the firm’s fund lineup.
Meanwhile, chief financial officer Craig Gentle stepped down earlier this year, replaced by UBS executive Caroline Waddington.
In an analyst note last week, RBC analyst Ben Bathurst said CEO Fitzpatrick had expressed confidence in recent investor meetings that the company was making progress on rolling out modernisation efforts for the firm, including a complete overhaul of its opaque and expensive fee structure.
“Following an eventful first 11 months in the role, we were struck by the CEO’s confidence in the partnership to adapt to charge changes being implemented in 2025, and the growth opportunity ahead,” Bathurst said.
“The CEO asserted his confidence in St James’s Place implementing the new charging structure on time. The new charges will facilitate simpler comparison with peers, and should address a key area of historical media criticism, by effectively unbundling the pricing of a bundled service.”
St James’s Place management also said they have “no aspiration” to cater to institutional clients, instead focusing on implenenting the new fee structure, addressing the “historical ongoing advice issues”, and continuing to cut costs, according to Bathurst.
