"There will be no IFA job losses, as those previously based in Cyprus and Luxembourg will be working within and from other deVere Group offices," the spokesman said.
The closure of the deVere Group office in Cyprus, which had been located in Limassol, and the one in luxembourg on Rue de la Grève, follows the ending, earlier this year, of the deVere Group’s being licenced by Belgium’s Financial Services and Markets Authority. It also comes as the company is engaged in a strategic review of its business.
As reported, deVere had used its Belgian licence to passport its services into Cyprus as well as Luxembourg.
In a statement, the deVere spokesman noted that the streamlining of certain parts of its operations would enable deVere to "further strengthen its market-leading position", while enabling it to offer a better standard of services and broader range of advice and products to its clients.
Strategic review
In March, deVere Group director Mike Coady announced the strategic review, noting that as the company entered its eleventh year in business, “it seemed a good time to step back and look at which markets we want to be in, and invest in, and which we might not".
One of the first things to emerge from this was the creation of a new “executive committee” for the company’s European operations, to be headed up by Coady, as part of a corporate effort to“raise standards throughout the region” while overseeing business development, best practice policies and corporate governance matters.
Since January, deVere has announced it was planning to get out of the Belgium and Portuguese markets; expand its operations in the UK, Germany and Spain; and enter the Nigerian market with an outpost in the city of Lagos. It also said it would expand its operations in Cape Town, Johannesburg, and Accra, close three peripheral South African offices, and relocate its Dubai operation to a larger premises, so that it might increase the number of consultants there by 50%.
And, instead of a pan-US operation it is now planning to focus on making its existing New York office a “super-hub” from which to look after its American clients.
Last month, it announced it had acquired Acuma, a Dubai-based rival with a team of 50.