London's newest banking boutique pays cash and is ok with working from home

Before he was a banker, Neil Passmore, the CEO of the newly formed boutique bank H&P, was a helicopter pilot in the British army. He's also an expert on the behaviour of captive ostriches. Neither skill is typical in London banking, but H&P is not a typical boutique.

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H&P employs 46 people, of whom 35 came from Hannam & Partners and 11 came from HCF. It mainly provides investment banking advice in the natural resources sector. But in the natural resources sector H&P offers everything, including M&A advice, and equity and debt capital raising in both the public and private markets. 

Passmore says this breadth within a niche means there won't be any job cuts following the merger and that H&P even has aspirations to hire two to three people over the next year, plus graduates. "London is still a great hub for the global resources business," he says. "If you focus on a particular sector or cluster, and you try and do everything you possibly can there, be that M&A or public and private equity or debt, then it's about the strength of that sector. – There might not be new listings, but there's a lot of private capital in London."

H&P is also differentiated by the ruggedness of its founders. Ian Hannam, the progenitor of Hannam & Partners and a former JPMorgan banker, is known for his big bonuses, his time in the SAS and his history flying Black Hawk helicopters searching for gold. He reportedly once said: "I've got more degrees than I can count, but I still talk like I'm illiterate, and my colleagues hate me for it."

Passmore doesn't talk like he's illiterate, but he does have a relatively lax approach to some things, like wanting people in the office. "We're very flexible. We were doing working from home long before COVID and one element of our appeal is that we've been able to offer people who live in Scotland or Liverpool more flexibility than big banks," he says. "We're very performance driven: you can get your work done where you need to get work done."

H&P also pays bonuses in cash, while big banks pay their bonuses in cash and stock. Passmore says there's a bonus clawback if people leave, but this only applies for the first year. 

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