Asset manager St James’s Place to cut 500 jobs as part of £200 million cost savings

St James’s Place is laying off around 500 staff as part of a £200 million savings drive.

The asset management firm plans to cut about a sixth of its 3,200 staff, according to an internal memo first reported by trading channel Citywire.

Earlier this year, St James’s Place said it would achieve £100 million in cost savings per year over the next two years, and expected to achieve £500 million in savings by 2030.

The plans were announced as part of a change in strategy under CEO Mark FitzPatrick, who joined last year.

The redundancies will not affect the London-listed firm’s stable of around 4,800 financial advisers across the country, who run their own smaller businesses under the St James’s Place umbrella.

Instead, the company’s 3,200 employees will be targeted for the cuts, a source familiar with the matter confirmed.

A spokesperson for St James’s Place said: ‘At our half-year results in July we committed to saving £100 million per year from the addressable cost base by 2027.

Our cost savings plans focus on simplifying and standardizing processes across the business, but a program of this size and scale will inevitably impact colleagues.

‘We have now started to consult colleagues to share our proposal on how this could impact the roles, the outcome of which will not be known until next year.’