Good morning and welcome to your Morning Briefing for Tuesday 21 October 2025. To get this in your inbox every morning click here.
IHT receipts for April-September rise to £4.4bn
Data from HM Revenue and Customs today (21 October) revealed that Inheritance Tax (IHT) receipts for April to September 2025 were £4.4bn, which is £100m higher than the same period last year, an increase of 2.3%.
Nucleus has predicted off the back of these results, that the full year receipts may be approximately £8.8bn (£8.2bn in 2024/25).
UK wealth managers less crypto confident than global peers
Only 27% of UK wealth managers feel equipped to advise their clients on crypto, far behind the global average of 47% and the US at 63%.
This is according to research from Avaloq which also found 33% of UK wealth managers express interest in incorporating crypto and digital assets in their investment proposals compared to 60% globally, and 79% in the US.
We need to entertain people to get them investing
For about 24 hours at the start of October, I went viral talking about investing. Tough to know what exactly counts as viral, but I reckon 3.5m views on TikTok counts, writes 7IM head of equity strategy Ben Kumar.
The clip was me doing the business news on LBC radio with Tom Swarbrick. I’ve been doing it for close to fourteen years now (5.25pm every evening, if you fancy tuning in).
When I started doing the news slot, TikTok was still five years away from existing, and over that time, I’ve covered everything from conflicts to COVID to crypto.
What I (and my man Chris Justham) always try to do is to make things relevant and relatable. Sometimes we fail, and sometimes, we’ll say something which just happens to strike the right chord at the right time.
Quote Of The Day
Property market data specialists CoStar report that UK commercial building activity is now at the weakest level in over a decade
– Hargreaves Lansdown head of equity funds Steve Clayton on the pace of new building starts
Stat Attack
Nine in ten UK firms are concerned about increased legal and regulatory risks from lighter regulation under the government’s Leeds Reforms, according to new research.
The findings were revealed in the ‘Red Tape Trade-Off Study’ by compliance training provider Skillcast, which surveyed 500 full-time employees in the banking and financial services, legal, and HR sectors to assess how firms are responding to the reforms and lighter regulation.
Source: Skillcast
In Other News
The Chartered Institute for Securities & Investment (CISI) has appointed three new members to its board.
Rosie Glazebrook, Susan Daniel and Nicholas Garnish have all been elected to serve.
Glazebrook is a senior independent director at Make UK, where she also chairs the nominations and remuneration committee.
She also has experience driving trade and investment initiatives with private sector and government partners.
Glazebrook recently joined the advisory board of the Commonwealth Enterprise and Investment Council, where she served as chief executive until June 2025.
Daniel has over 37 years of professional experience working in leadership positions in the UK, Oman and the UAE. Her area of expertise includes governance, risk management, internal audit and compliance.
She is the founder and chief executive of Aquilae Consulting. Prior to this, she was chief risk officer for ADQ (Abu Dhabi Development Holding Company) and before that, chief risk and assurance officer for Oman Investment Authority (OIA),
Daniel was also one of the advisory partners at PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC), leading large advisory projects for the Oman government.
Garnish is the head of Treasury for Europe, Asia and Australia at the Canadian Imperial Bank of Commerce in London. He has held several senior City appointments over the course of his career.
He was previously the global COO for Collateral and Liquidity Management at LCH Clearnet and managing director, treasurer and global head of foreign exchange at Jefferies.
He is a Chartered member of the CISI, a Fellow and Chartered Manager of the Chartered Management Institute.
Octopus Ventures, part of Octopus Group, has appointed Jamie Kennell as senior partner and head of portfolio strategy.
Kennell joins from Pembroke Investment Managers, who manage the £300m Pembroke Venture Capital Trust (VCT).
He initially joined Pembroke as Head of Investment Portfolio, where he developed and oversaw an evolution and transformation of the VCT’s portfolio strategy, reporting, and execution.
This success led to his appointment as chief investment officer in May 2023.
Prior to Pembroke, and during his 35-year career in finance, he has taken on senior roles with NatWest Markets, KPMG and 3i PLC.
Latterly, he worked with Corporate Finance International, a leading global group of middle-market investment banks and corporate finance advisers, and Beringea, the transatlantic venture capital investor.
Reporting into Erin Platts, CEO of Octopus Ventures & Octopus Investments, he will be responsible for strategic oversight of portfolio performance across the funds managed by Octopus Ventures.
Trump downplays Taiwan risk in China talks, expects fair trade deal (Reuters)
Japan stocks surge as Sanae Takaichi becomes prime minister (Financial Times)
UK borrowing overshoots forecast by £7.2 billion ahead of Budget (Bloomberg)
Did You See?
The Financial Conduct Authority has warned that financial crime oversight among corporate finance firms shows significant gaps.
A recent FCA survey found that two-thirds of corporate finance firms not required to submit financial crime returns may be falling short of money laundering rules.
Corporate finance firms, which help businesses raise capital by connecting them with investors and lenders, are vital to the UK economy, making effective financial crime controls essential.
The FCA noted that 11% of firms surveyed had no documented business-wide risk assessment, a requirement under the Money Laundering Regulations. Without this, firms risk exposing themselves and the wider market to money laundering, fraud and other forms of financial crime.