Collins Stewart

Collins Stewart acquired Tullett & Tokyo Liberty in 2003 through a reverse takeover bid, renaming the combined group's interdealer brokerage unit Tullett Prebon. For nearly eight years the two businesses operated under the same corporate parent, with the interdealer broker acting as a distinct but fully-owned division. They were formally separated in May 2011 when Collins Stewart demerged Tullett Prebon into an independently listed company on the London Stock Exchange.

Terry Smith executed a management buyout of Collins Stewart in 2000, taking the firm from a private partnership into a publicly listed consolidator. His strategy used the firm's own quoted shares to acquire dozens of smaller wealth management, advisory, and brokerage shops, scaling assets under management rapidly through M&A rather than pure organic growth. Smith also imposed his high-conviction buy-and-hold equity philosophy on the discretionary portfolios managed for clients.

Following the May 2011 demerger of Tullett Prebon, Collins Stewart became a standalone wealth management and corporate advisory firm listed on the London Stock Exchange. Its independence lasted only a few months: in October 2011, Canadian financial services group Canaccord Genuity agreed to acquire Collins Stewart for approximately £253 million in a recommended cash offer. The deal completed in early 2012, integrating Collins Stewart's operations into Canaccord's global wealth management and capital markets platform.

Collins Stewart operated three main business lines. Its stockbroking and corporate advisory arm advised UK small- and mid-cap companies on M&A and capital raising while making markets in their securities. The wealth management division managed discretionary portfolios for mass-affluent and high-net-worth clients, concentrated in London and the Channel Islands tax havens. The third arm was its controlling interest in interdealer broker Tullett Prebon, which matched trades for institutional dealers across interest rates, currencies, and fixed income globally.

Smith's time at Collins Stewart served as a live laboratory for the concentrated, low-turnover equity philosophy he would systematize at Fundsmith after leaving the firm. At Collins Stewart he ran model portfolios that held a small number of high-quality companies for years, rejecting the transaction-heavy approach common among UK private-client brokers. The public-company structure also taught him the friction of running an investment philosophy inside a regulated, M&A-driven listed entity — a lesson he reversed by keeping Fundsmith private and exclusively investment-focused.