Chartered Financial Planner firm Punter Southall Wealth has expanded the size of its Birmingham team to nine by adding two new Financial Planners to meet growing demand in the West Midlands.

Rising transport, clothing and energy costs spurred a surprise doubling of CPI inflation from 0.7% in March to 1.5% in April.

The £232m takeover of Financial Planning-led wealth manager AFH Financial Group has been given the green light by the FCA.

Advice group Socium has responded to speculation about its withdrawn offer to buy financial adviser network and DFM Beaufort.

Insurance firm Phoenix Group is in discussions to sell its European business to European Life Group Holding.

St Albans-based Financial Planning firm Lumin Wealth has merged with Swiss financial services provider VZ Group in order to boost organic growth and acquisition activity.

The Government is to give its Insolvency Service greater powers to tackle firms that try to ‘phoenix’ by setting up near identical new businesses to avoid liabilities and will also target directors who deliberately dissolve firms to avoid bills.

Goldman Sachs is to launch a robo advice app for UK users of its digital bank Marcus and plans to offer automated investment management by the first quarter of next year.

The Financial Services Compensation Scheme (FSCS) has welcomed the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) consultation paper tackling phoenixing saying it will help “keep bad actors out of the market”.

A trio have been sentenced for their involvement in a number of insurance fraud plots led by boxer Hamid Sediqi.