# Chartered Accountants Benevolent Association Chartered Accountants Benevolent Association is an Endowment / Foundation based in Rugby, United Kingdom. ## Overview - **Organization type:** Endowment / Foundation - **Headquarters:** Rugby, United Kingdom - **Region:** Europe - **Address:** Swift Park, Old Leicester Road, Rugby, Warwickshire, CV21 1DZ, United Kingdom - **Founded:** 1886 - **Assets under management:** <$200M (Altss estimate) - **Website:** www.caba.org.uk - **LinkedIn:** https://uk.linkedin.com/company/chartered-accountants-benevolent-association ## Regulatory record - **Reports private funds:** No ## About Founded in 1886, the Chartered Accountants Benevolent Association is the occupational charity for members of the Institute of Chartered Accountants in England and Wales (ICAEW), with the ICAEW President serving as its Patron. The organization, led by CEO Cristian Holmes and Board Chair Hemant Patel, provides free, confidential support to trainees and chartered accountants, while overseeing an endowment designed to sustainably fund its charitable mission. The investment portfolio allocates across a fund-of-funds strategy, direct residential real estate holdings in the United Kingdom, a secondaries and special situations book, and a direct loan book to its beneficiaries. The direct real estate component includes a portfolio of residential investment properties across various UK locations, alongside the commercial asset Merrett House in Rugby. The investment committee, which includes Wellcome Trust Principal Robert Holl (per Altss research), oversees the mix of external fund commitments and direct income-generating assets that fund the charity's operations. The charity operates from its headquarters at Merrett House in Rugby, Warwickshire, and partners with service providers such as Kooth and Qwell for online counselling and mental health support to its members. It maintains a membership in the Association of Charitable Organisations, the umbrella body for benevolent funds in the UK, and the National Council for Voluntary Organisations, embedding it within the broader charitable infrastructure. Structurally, CABA differs from a conventional foundation by running an operating charitable model directly alongside its investment portfolio — the loan book to individual beneficiaries functions as both a programmatic tool and a fixed-income-like asset, blurring the line between grant-making and investing. This dual identity as an active service provider and an endowment investor makes its allocation decisions unusually sensitive to the economic cycles affecting the accounting profession itself. ## Sectors - Fund of Funds - Secondaries & Special Situations - Real Estate - Private Credit ## People - Cristian Holmes — Chief Executive Officer - Hemant Patel — Chair of the Board of Trustees - Robert Holl — Member of the Investment Committee ## Questions ### Who runs investment decisions at CABA? The Board of Trustees, chaired by Hemant Patel, bears ultimate fiduciary responsibility for the endowment. The Investment Committee, which includes Robert Holl — a Principal at the Wellcome Trust — provides specialist oversight on asset allocation and manager selection across the fund-of-funds portfolio, direct real estate, and the loan book to ICAEW members (per Altss research). ### How is CABA's portfolio structured? CABA's endowment adopts a hybrid structure combining external fund commitments — including a fund-of-funds strategy and secondaries and special situations exposure — with directly held UK residential property and a bespoke loan book offered to chartered accountants in need. This mix ties investment returns directly to the charity's mission-focused lending and housing support programs. ### Does CABA make direct investments or only fund commitments? CABA makes both. It commits capital to external funds via a fund-of-funds approach and participates in secondaries. At the same time, it directly owns and manages a portfolio of residential investment properties and operates a direct beneficiary loan book — making it a rare example of an endowment that acts as a direct credit provider to its members. ### How is CABA related to the ICAEW? CABA is the official occupational charity for members of the Institute of Chartered Accountants in England and Wales (ICAEW). The President of the ICAEW serves as CABA's Patron, and the charity is the primary provider of welfare and mental health support to the institute's trainees and chartered accountants across the UK. ### What is CABA's known posture on liquidity and spending? While CABA does not publicly disclose a specific spending rule, its portfolio architecture — combining illiquid fund commitments with directly held property and an income-generating loan book — signals a strategy designed to generate steady distributable cash flows alongside capital appreciation to match its charitable disbursement requirements. ### What professional networks or industry bodies does CABA belong to? CABA is a member of the Association of Charitable Organisations, the umbrella body for benevolent funds in the UK, and the National Council for Voluntary Organisations. It also has ties to Chartered Accountants Worldwide as part of the global network of chartered accountancy institutes. ## Related profiles - [Mary Reynolds Babcock Foundation](https://altss.com/profile/mary-reynolds-babcock-foundation) - [Hazelden Betty Ford Foundation](https://altss.com/profile/hazelden-betty-ford-foundation) --- Last updated: 2026-06-03T20:00:00.000Z Canonical page: https://altss.com/profile/chartered-accountants-benevolent-association Maintained by Altss — https://altss.com — methodology: https://altss.com/methodology