Graham Wellesley, 8th Earl Cowley

Last updated


The Earl Cowley
Born
Garret Graham Wellesley

(1965-03-30) 30 March 1965 (age 58)
Alma mater Franklin College, Switzerland
OccupationBusinessperson
Children3
Parent(s)Garret Wellesley, 7th Earl Cowley
Suzanne Lennon

Garret Graham Wellesley, 8th Earl of Cowley (born 30 March 1965), styled Viscount Dangan from 1975 to 2016, is a British hereditary peer and businessman. Previously an entrepreneur in derivatives and foreign exchange trading, he is the founder and CEO of UK alternative lender Wellesley & Co.

Contents

Early life

Graham Wellesley was born in 1965, the son of Garret Wellesley, 7th Earl Cowley, and his first wife, (Elizabeth) Suzanne Lennon. [1] He has an elder sister, Lady Tara (born 1962). He is a descendant of Henry Wellesley, 1st Baron Cowley, brother of the Duke of Wellington. [2] He spent his early years in California before coming to the UK aged 10, where he attended the American Community School in Hillingdon, west London. [3]

After graduating with a degree in economics from Franklin College, Switzerland, he served for 18 months in the Household Cavalry. [3]

Career

Wellesley’s financial career began in 1985 as a derivatives trader at the London stockbroking firm Hoare Govett, from where he moved to two further derivatives trading roles at Banque Indosuez and ING Charterhouse. [3] In 1992, he became head of foreign exchange trading at global metals trader Gerald Metals. [3]

In 1995, he established the UK foreign exchange market maker IFX, which specialised in contracts for difference (CFDs) and spread bets on equity prices. [2] In 1999, he and another director, Lorenzo Naldini, purchased the 51% of the business owned by its US parent company IFX Corp in a buyout that left them as sole shareholders. [4]

In 2000, IFX was bought by the football pools operator Zetters for £20.4million in a reverse takeover, forming a new entity – IFX Group – with Wellesley as group chief executive.[ citation needed ] Two years later the company sold its pools business. [5]

In 2003, Wellesley and Naldini left IFX following a disagreement with the board and co-founded ODL Securities, an online foreign exchange and derivatives broker. [6]

In 2005, ODL was the whistleblower in an attempted banking fraud by US hedge fund Bayou. Bayou opened an account with ODL, depositing $101million and requesting two transactions that were refused by the management, who notified the UK Financial Services Authority. [7]

In 2010, Wellesley and Naldini sold their 50% stake in ODL to US foreign exchange firm FXCM Holdings, creating a business employing around 1,000 staff. [8] In December that year, the newly enlarged entity floated on the New York Stock Exchange. [9]

In 2013, Graham Wellesley co-founded alternative lender Wellesley & Co. with three other shareholders, taking the role of chief executive. [10] The following year the company issued what at the time was the largest ever loan by a peer-to-peer lender – a £8.3million bridging loan to a UK urban regeneration scheme. [11]

Personal life

In 1990, Wellesley married Claire L. Brighton. The couple have two sons and a daughter: [1]

Ancestry

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Financial market</span> Generic term for all markets in which trading takes place with capital

A financial market is a market in which people trade financial securities and derivatives at low transaction costs. Some of the securities include stocks and bonds, raw materials and precious metals, which are known in the financial markets as commodities.

Wellesley may refer to:

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Financial services</span> Economic service provided by the finance industry

Financial services are economic services tied to finance provided by financial institutions. Financial services encompass a broad range of service sector activities, especially as concerns financial management and consumer finance.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Earl Cowley</span> Earldom in the Peerage of the United Kingdom

Earl Cowley is a title in the Peerage of the United Kingdom. It was created in 1857 for the diplomat Henry Wellesley, 2nd Baron Cowley. He was Ambassador to France from 1852 to 1867. He was made Viscount Dangan, of Dangan in the County of Meath, at the same time as he was given the earldom. This title is also in the Peerage of the United Kingdom. Lord Cowley was the eldest son of Henry Wellesley, 1st Baron Cowley, who like his son served as Ambassador to France. In 1828 he was created Baron Cowley, of Wellesley in the County of Somerset, in the Peerage of the United Kingdom. A member of the prominent Wellesley family, Cowley was the fifth and youngest son of Garret Wellesley, 1st Earl of Mornington, and the younger brother of Arthur Wellesley, 1st Duke of Wellington, and Richard Wellesley, 1st Marquess Wellesley.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Garret Wesley, 1st Earl of Mornington</span> Anglo-Irish politician and composer, father of Duke of Wellington

Garret Colley Wesley, 1st Earl of Mornington was an Anglo-Irish politician and composer, as well as the father of several distinguished military commanders and politicians of Great Britain and Ireland.

In finance, a contract for difference (CFD) is a legally binding agreement that creates, defines, and governs mutual rights and obligations between two parties, typically described as "buyer" and "seller", stipulating that the buyer will pay to the seller the difference between the current value of an asset and its value at contract time. If the closing trade price is higher than the opening price, then the seller will pay the buyer the difference, and that will be the buyer's profit. The opposite is also true. That is, if the current asset price is lower at the exit price than the value at the contract's opening, then the seller, rather than the buyer, will benefit from the difference.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">IG Group</span> British online trading company

IG Group Holdings plc, trading as IG Group, is a United Kingdom-based online trading provider, offering access to spread betting and CFD trading, which allow traders to bet on the direction of equities, bonds and currencies without owning the underlying assets.

Peer-to-peer lending, also abbreviated as P2P lending, is the practice of lending money to individuals or businesses through online services that match lenders with borrowers. Peer-to-peer lending companies often offer their services online, and attempt to operate with lower overhead and provide their services more cheaply than traditional financial institutions. As a result, lenders can earn higher returns compared to savings and investment products offered by banks, while borrowers can borrow money at lower interest rates, even after the P2P lending company has taken a fee for providing the match-making platform and credit checking the borrower. There is the risk of the borrower defaulting on the loans taken out from peer-lending websites.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Zopa</span> British financial services company

Zopa Bank Ltd. is a British online bank which offers deposit accounts, personal loans and credit cards. It began as the world's first peer-to-peer lending company in 2005 and gained a full banking licence in 2020. The peer-to-peer side of its business closed in December 2021.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Virgin Money US</span> Defunct loans company

Virgin Money US was a peer-to-peer loans and loan-servicing company which was for a short time part of Virgin Money.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Richard Wesley, 1st Baron Mornington</span> Irish peer

Richard Colley Wesley, 1st Baron Mornington was an Irish peer, best remembered as the grandfather of Arthur Wellesley, 1st Duke of Wellington.

FXCM, also known as Forex Capital Markets, is a retail foreign exchange broker for trading on the foreign exchange market. FXCM allows people to speculate on the foreign exchange market and provides trading in contract for difference (CFDs) on major indices and commodities such as gold and crude oil. It is based in London.

GAIN Capital was a US-based provider of online trading services, headquartered in Bedminster, New Jersey until it was acquired by StoneX Group in 2020. The company provided market access and trade execution services in foreign exchange, contracts for difference (CFDs) and exchange-based products to retail and institutional investors. Trading was provided via one of two electronic trading platforms, its own proprietary FOREXTrader PRO later renamed as StoneX Pro and MetaTrader 4. GAIN Capital allowed retail and institutional clients to speculate on global foreign exchange markets in what is known as ‘margin forex trading’.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Funding Circle</span> Commercial lender

Funding Circle is a commercial lender. Originally it was a peer-to-peer lending marketplace that allowed the public to lend money directly to small and medium-sized businesses. Through this exchange businesses access lower costs of financing than they would get at a bank and the public are able to become lenders and in doing so make a return on their capital. It closed its lending option to "retail investors" between 2020 and 2022, and then announced, in March 2022, that it had made the closure permanent.

LendInvest is a non-bank mortgage lender in the UK, and is a property lending and investing platform. As an alternative Fintech lender in the property market, LendInvest provides finance to property professionals and small and medium-sized businesses (SMEs) around the UK. It also makes it possible for individuals, corporates and institutions to invest in secured property loans originated and underwritten by its mortgage team.

Wellesley Group is an established alternative property investment platform, that issues Bond investments to the UK retail market. The Wellesley Group consists of Wellesley & Co., Wellesley Finance Plc and Wellesley Group Investors Ltd. Wellesley Group is named after co-founder Graham Wellesley, 8th Earl Cowley, who was previously Chief Executive of IFX and Finspreads.

Unbolted is a UK based online personal asset-based peer-to-peer lending platform, where individuals can borrow from other individuals by using high value personal assets such as luxury watches, cars, fine arts, antiques, jewellery and commodities such as gold. The company started trading in November 2014 and has its offices in London.

Lieutenant Colonel William Henry Wellesley, 2nd Earl Cowley was an English aristocrat and soldier.

Lieutenant Christian Arthur Wellesley, 4th Earl Cowley, known as Viscount Dangan from 1895 to 1919, was an English aristocrat and actor known by the name Arthur Wellesley.

Garret Wellesley, 7th Earl Cowley was an English-American banker.

References

  1. 1 2 "Garret Wellesley Obituary (1934 - 2016) - Reno, NV - the Reno Journal-Gazette and Mason Valley News". www.legacy.com. Retrieved 16 June 2021.
  2. 1 2 "Zetters spreads its bets". The Guardian . 25 August 2000. Retrieved 15 November 2016.
  3. 1 2 3 4 Coppock, John (22 August 2002). "IFX Chief plays against odds: Nobleman Wellesley focuses on tax-free financial speculation". Wall Street Journal .
  4. "IFX applies to join LME". Metal Bulletin. 15 July 1999.
  5. Chisholm, Jamie (31 May 2002). "Zetters bets on transformation". Financial Times .
  6. Dey, Iain (23 July 2006). "Elliot takes non-executive chair at ODL". The Daily Telegraph . Retrieved 15 November 2016.
  7. Moore, James (27 September 2005). "London firm 'was link in US banking fraud case'". The Daily Telegraph . Retrieved 15 November 2016.
  8. Wilson, Harry (4 May 2010). "Forex broker ODL accepts US takeover". The Daily Telegraph . Retrieved 15 November 2016.
  9. "FXCM's IPO Raises $211 Million at Midpoint of Range". Bloomberg . 2 December 2010. Retrieved 16 March 2017.
  10. "Peer to peer lending market gets new risk-capital entrant". City AM . 18 November 2013. Retrieved 15 November 2016.
  11. Dunkley, Emma; Sharman, Andy (1 April 2014). "Largest P2P loan to fund urban regeneration scheme" . Financial Times . Archived from the original on 11 December 2022. Retrieved 15 November 2016.
Peerage of the United Kingdom
Preceded by
Garret Wellesley
Earl Cowley
2016–present
Incumbent
heir apparent:
Henry Wellesley, Viscount Dangan