Simon Robey scores £20mn payday as Robey Warshaw profits climb

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Sir Simon Robey, co-founder of the boutique UK advisory firm Robey Warshaw, earned £20.4mn in the last financial year, underscoring his status as one of Europe’s highest-earning dealmakers.

Annual accounts published on Friday for Robey Warshaw — whose 18-person workforce includes former chancellor George Osborne — illustrate the firm’s continued success in scoring advisory mandates for mergers and acquisitions in the UK.

They also highlight how the tiny London-based firm has managed to generate hefty payouts even as a global downturn in dealmaking has resulted in Wall Street and global banks shedding staff and trimming bonuses.

Robey Warshaw’s operating profits climbed 5.7 per cent to £31.8mn in the year to the end of March 2023, while its revenues rose 15.8 per cent £46.1mn.

The figures account for the firm’s work on deals including the £2.5bn acquisition of Chelsea Football Club, United Health Group’s £1.2bn purchase of health information supplier EMIS and HSBC’s £1 rescue deal to take over Silicon Valley Bank UK earlier this year.

During that period, Robey Warshaw also began assisting Microsoft on its efforts to get the UK’s competition authority to clear its $75bn purchase of Activision. The transaction was eventually cleared this October.

The filings show that the firm’s highest-paid partner earned £20.4mn — up from £17.2mn a year earlier. While the accounts do not name the partner, it is Robey, according to people familiar with the situation.

The firm declined to comment.

Since launching in 2013, Robey, the former co-head of global M&A at Morgan Stanley, has personally earned more than £170mn, according to calculations by the Financial Times. The firm’s two other founding partners are Simon Warshaw, the former head of investment banking at UBS, and former Morgan Stanley banker Philip Apostolides.

Osborne joined as a partner 2021 and has found success working on mandates that must navigate around tricky government and policy issues, such as the Chelsea FC deal.

The group is structured as a limited liability partnership and is not liable for tax on its profits, with each partner responsible for tax on their own share. While the four partners do not draw a salary, its 14 employees saw their total wages climb to £9.4mn, from £6.7mn a year earlier.

Additional reporting by Michael O’Dwyer in London