The firm, part of UK-listed St James's Place, has brought over the CEO of Nexus Financial Services Pte in Asia.

(An earlier version of this article appeared yesterday on WealthBriefingAsia, sister news service to this one.)

St James’s Place Wealth Management Asia, the international business of UK-listed St James’s Place, has appointed Gary Harvey as its chief executive, taking the reins from Nigel Preston, who returns to the UK having led the Singapore business since 2015.

Harvey most recently was CEO at Nexus Financial Services Pte, a role he held from 2015. He has worked in the financial services sector for almost 30 years, including operational and strategic experience at CEO level. Harvey, a Singapore citizen, has over 20 years of experience in Asia and has been based in Singapore for the last 15 years.

Roles included an 18-year stint at AXA: he held the positions of CEO AXA Life Singapore and regional CEO for IPAC Wealth Management Asia. Harvey also worked for the Singapore Branch of Transamerica Life (Bermuda) prior to joining Nexus.

In addition, he is vice president of The Financial Planning Association of Singapore, an executive committee member of the Association of Financial Advisers (Singapore) and is a member of both the Australian and Singapore Institutes of Directors.

Among recent changes, St James’s Place Wealth Management Asia appointed Jonathan Asherson OBE as a senior advisor to its Asia advisory board. Asherson was previously regional director for the Association of Southeast Asian Nations and the Pacific at Rolls-Royce, and held positions in Siemens' industrial power business in China, Malaysia, Germany and the US. He is the non-executive chairman and advisor of Rolls-Royce Singapore; an independent director of Semcorp Industries; a director of Genting Singapore and the current chairman of the Singapore International Chamber of Commerce.

In July last year St James’s Place reported a sharp rise in net inflows of funds under management for the first six months of 2017. Flows rose to £4.3 billion ($5.65 billion) from £3.1 billion in H1, 2016. Funds under management stood at £83 billion at the end of June, from £65.6 billion. There were a total of 3,540 advisors at the end of June, up 3.7 per cent since the beginning of 2017.