Here's a funny thing. In August 2021 the giant investment group Aberdeen Standard Life ditched nearly all of its name and presented a glittering, down-with-the-kids, cool, resonant and exhilarating new name - abrdn. That's right, out went the much respected Standard Life bit, the vowels were stripped away from the rest and they saved thousands of caps lock keys from jamming by binning the capital letter as well.
This attracted much contumely from around the financial world but, most notably, in these very columns. The company became a laughing stock. My warnings went unheeded and the outcome all too predictable - employees of the unpronounceable enterprise found themselves publicly sneered at in the streets of the City, cat-called in coffee bars and satirised in the squash courts. Matters reached breaking strain when the Chief Investment Officer declared that the risibility and jeers were "Corporate bullying". But he failed to draw the obvious conclusion and just doubled-down on the original, stupid, renaming decision.
All has changed. Today in a stunning U-turn, the company has gone rummaging through its waste bins, retrieved those long-lost 'Es' and resinstated them in their rightful place.
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| Source: AJ Bell |
Should we let the church bells ring out and pop the corks in celebration of a victory for the English language? Perhaps. They omitted to find the capital 'A' and are stuck with the lower case. However they have added the word "group" to the name. Now this is going to increase the cost of typing and wear out more letters on their word processing keyboards [Do they still use those? Ed] and I would expect the markets to mark their shares down quite heftily once the implications sink in. Should I risk the Ramblings Retirement Fund on a quick flutter by selling their shares short, or should I leave it safely in the big blue-and-white striped jug on the mantlepiece?
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