This week - platforms rally, we take a sneak preview at total platform AUA and we ask IFAs about offshore platforms.

A quiet week this week with most of the UK seemingly on half-term holiday - as someone without kids of school age, half-term is like the scene in Chitty Chitty Bang Bang where Dick Van Dyke liberates the children from the evil Child Catcher and the palace is suddenly over-run with children. Where on earth do they all come from?!

Notwithstanding that, key news to come out this week includes Standard Life hitting £3bn on the platform. With recent announcements from Cofunds about breaking the £20bn hurdle and Ascentric climbing north of £1bn, we congratulate them all - and note their increased marketing budgets accordingly ;0) In November we'll be releasing our updated AUA chart as at Q309 and the growth rates are really interesting to see - we'll share this research with you all but we believe IFA platforms will top £80bn from a figure of £71.3bn as at Q209. In other news some disgruntled IFAs react to the sale of Edward Jones to Towry Law (and we've had calls directly here about it too) -but for those able to be dispassionate, you have to admire the rapacious beast in action. People go on about consolidation at conferences - well here it is in action. On the surface of it, not a bad client for SEI....

Offshore platforms. And I mean platforms for rich people with money in places like Jersey, not platforms with SICAVs. We have been contacted by several IFAs about the availability of such a platform and as far as we know, there is nothing currently available to suit their particular requirements. If you're an IFA and you would use a platform to service offshore clients, please drop us a quick note. We'll check out the overall demand for this and if it's sufficient, we'll take it forward with some potential providers and see what they say.