Kingswood has reached an agreement to acquire retirement and investment planning advice specialist, DJ Cooke Financial Planning.

The deal, subject to completion, will increase Kingswood’s UK funds under advice/management to £6.3bn from approximately 16,240 active clients.

Following its acquisition of the business assets of DJ Cooke (Life & Pensions), Kingswood Group’s AuA will total more than £8bn from a combination of both global retail and institutional clients.

DJ Cooke CEO, David Cooke, is the sole adviser to around 340 client households with approximately £70m AuA.

On an underlying basis for the 12-month period up to the end of December 2021, DJ Cooke generated unaudited revenue of approximately £474,000 and unaudited EBITDA of approximately £227,000.

Commenting on the agreement, Kingswood UK CEO, David Lawrence, said: “I am delighted to welcome David and the team at DJ Cooke Financial Planning Limited into Kingswood.

“This is our first acquisition of 2022 and we continue to have a strong pipeline of high-quality UK opportunities under negotiation, five of which are in the exclusive due diligence stage.”

Cooke added: “I am very excited to join the Kingswood group. I feel they share my values, will provide excellent client service and equally importantly will offer continuity for my colleagues and clients.

“This will make client transition as smooth as possible and enable me to continue to oversee my clients’ best interests for the future.”

Following completion, around £1.5m is payable over a two-year period, with £749k to be paid at closing and the balance paid on a deferred basis, some of which is subject to the achievement of pre-agreed performance targets.

On completion, the acquisition will be funded from funds recently received by Kingswood from the issue of new convertible preference shares.

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