Chartered Financial Planner Fairstone has agreed its seventh acquisition deal this year with South East firm Mantle Financial Planning which has £480m in Funds Under Management. 

Fairstone has added almost £1.2bn in funds under management so far this year through its under its Downstream Buy Out progressive acquisition model. 

The new DBO deal with Mantle for an undisclosed sum brings total assets under management close to £10bn and funds under advice to almost £12bn.

Fairstone said it would continue to look for more acquisitions.

Mantle Financial Planning has over 1,750 clients, 11 advisers and 13 support staff. It has gross fee income of £3.3m and funds under management of over £480m.

It has two offices, one in Epsom, Surrey and another in Twickenham. It specialises in pension planning and investment management.

It has been a busy few months for Fairstone. In May Fairstone signed a deal with Chartered Financial Planner firm Financial Concepts, adding funds under management of £104m. In June the firm signed up Lincs firm MT Financial Management to join its acquisition programme.

Fairstone’s DBO approach tries to ensure that companies are fully integrated with Fairstone prior to final acquisition. Mantle Financial Planning has started this pre-acquisition process. The integration process typically lasts around two years before Fairstone finally acquires the business.

Mantle Financial Planning principal Colin Caulfield said: “We decided to join Fairstone to help us to deal with the increasing difficulties of being a medium-sized IFA directly regulated by the FCA. Joining Fairstone was the right decision as they are an independent, Chartered, national firm which is not just interested in the client bank, but the company as a whole.

“We look forward to integrating with Fairstone and we firmly believe this will be in the long-term best interests of both our clients and the company.”

Fairstone CEO Lee Hartley said: “We are always looking for strong, high quality businesses with ambitious growth plans to join Fairstone and whilst we recognise that we are all moving into a different climate with challenges ahead, we are in a strong position and we will continue to onboard new DBO firms at our forecasted volume.”