Coutts Bank is well known as one of the leading Private Banks in the UK. What is not so well known is that Coutts has a significant and growing Commercial Banking division.

Based within Coutts headquarters at 440 Strand, the Coutts Commercial Banking team is 100 people strong. The division is headed by Chris Dos Santos, who says:

‘As one of the UK’s leading private banks and wealth managers, Coutts has a long history of managing the affairs of people with complicated financial needs. Many Coutts clients have created their wealth through their business activities, whether that is as an investor, owner manager, or partner in a professional firm. Throughout our history, as well as helping them with their personal affairs, we have also offered the required services and products for their businesses’.

In the early 1990s, Coutts identified that its Commercial business had grown to such a size that it should be managed as a separate business. Coutts Commercial structured itself on sector lines, recognising that added value was delivered to the client by offering not just expertise in banking matters generally, but by ensuring that its Commercial Bankers understood the sector of business in which the individual clients operated.

Coutts was one of the first banks to offer this approach to the market, with the early sectors covered being:

• Media  - music, TV, film, theatre & arts, advertising and publishing.
• Professional Practices – legal, accountancy, financial services and latterly private equity and hedge funds.
• Commercial property.
• Charities and not-for-profit organisations.

Since the early 1990s, Coutts sector expertise has grown, with managers now specialising in the following additional areas:

• Healthcare.
• Insurance.
• Education.
• Premium retail.    

Chris adds ‘For many Coutts private clients, the most significant part of their wealth is tied up in their businesses. It was, therefore, natural for Coutts to offer commercial banking services as part of its holistic approach to wealth management. These days, Coutts Commercial does bank businesses, from £1m turnover concerns up to large, international corporates, where there may be no existing private client connection. However, these businesses appreciate the quality of service we provide and understand the long-term benefits of our relationship approach, as opposed to the rather transactional market environment that became so prevalent prior to the credit crunch. Obviously one of our core aims remains to offer the shareholders and managers of these businesses access to the personal services for which Coutts is well known, but our Commercial Banking service is more than capable to compete on a standalone basis’.

Article submitted by Coutts & Co - Private and Commercial Banking