Barclays Wealth International is currently attracting clients at the rate of around 25,000 per year, according to Cameron Fowler, the unit’s managing director.

The unit, one of the largest within Barclays Wealth, specialises in banking and investments for global affluent individuals.

“Growth really kicked off in the fourth quarter of last year and we’re now seeing around 1,000 leads per month from the branch network,” Mr Fowler told WealthBriefing.

“We are currently approaching 400 client facing staff, which is an increase of 35 per cent over the past six months”, he said. “Among the many changes we are making to the business to better support our clients and staff, we have put in place a new investment platform and will be rolling out an improved contact management system in Q2.”

The business, which has very much an offshore focus and looks after clients with investable assets just under the threshold for private banking, recognises that even at this level, clients are always multi-banked.

It specialises in providing services to British expatriates, foreign nationals, City professionals, members of the media and entertainment industry - especially footballers - and entrepreneurs. With several hundred clients moving up to the private bank each year, the unit is seen as an entry point to Barclays Wealth. According to Mr Fowler, the clients are joined by between 5 and 10 relationship managers who move across to the private bank annually.

Mr Fowler, a Canadian national whose previous roles at Barclays Wealth were as Chief Operating Officer of the UK Private Bank and Head of Europe for the International Private Bank, said that Barclays Wealth International will double in size over the next 5 years, driven largely by growth in the Middle East from Dubai, and Asia from Singapore.

Barclays Wealth International operates across13 jurisdictions. Historically the business’s focus has been on the global bank platform that offers multicurrency accounts, payments, FX, and international lending and mortgages.

Recent growth has been driven from the investment capability. Barclays Wealth leverages its links with Barclays Capital and Barclays Global Investors to provide clients with market leading investment products which can be accessed through both a high touch face-to-face relationship service and the business’s online capabilities.