Financial Dynamics

This article is part of the Nuclear Spin project of Spinwatch.

Financial Dynamics, now known as simply FD, is a financial and corporate PR and lobbying firm. It has offices in Europe, the US, Asia, the Middle East and South Africa.

Its lobbying arm is called FD Public Affairs

History

It was formerly part of the Cordiant Group which was taken over by WPP in 2003 at which point Financial Dyamnics undertook a Management Buy Out. In September 2006, it was then acquired for £139m by US firm FTI Consulting. PR Week called the deal significant “because the buyer, FTI, is an economic and management consultancy, rather than a marketing services group”. The Financial Times wrote that the deal underlies “the increasing value that corporate clients place on issues such as reputation management.”

In 2005 it acquired LLM Communications, a PR company with close links to the Labour Party. The renamed agency, FD-LLM, included co-founder of LLM Jon Mendelsohn, a former adviser to Tony Blair. In August 2007, Mendelsohn left the company to become director of General Election resources at the Labour Party and its chief fundraiser. Mendelsohn was later embroiled in Labour’s funding scandal, and faced calls to quit in December 2007 after it was alleged he knew of funding arrangements to fund the Labour party through intermediaries.

In December 2005 FD acquired Dittus Communications, a Washington DC based lobbying firm .

Dittus is headed up by Gloria Dittus, “known locally for both her PR skills and party-hosting prowess.” By its own admission, Dittus has “been involved in many controversial campaigns including nuclear waste disposal, food safety and protecting legal immigration.”

In a proposal sent to tobacco firm Philip Morris, Dittus outlined its proposed approach to promoting tobacco industry supported legislation on dealing with youth smoking. It included the use of “third parties” in its PR campaign. Later in its proposals it outlines it credentials for the benefit of Philip Morris. “Our principals have played critical roles in campaigns concerning the recent debate on legal immigration, electricity deregulation security over the Internet, telecommunications deregulation, product liability reform, the BTU tax, licensing the Seabrook nuclear power plant, reforming the nation’s agriculture and housing programs, and public policy issues impacting the American software industry.”

FD's former managing director Nick Miles had an "acrimonious split" from the company in 2002 and went on to form M Communications.

Clients

FD advises more than 250 clients, ranging from fast-growing entrepreneurial businesses to the largest corporations, professional firms and public bodies.

• Shell Financial Dynamics is Shell’s external PR company in Ireland. In the country, Shell has been involved in the extremely controversial proposed Corrib pipeline that will deliver natural gas from 80 kilometers off the Mayo coast to the mainland. For two years, campaigners have demanded that Shell reroute the pipeline away from a rural hamlet called Rossport and build the processing facility offshore. This culminated in 2005 with five men “the Rossport five” spending 94 days in jail for refusing to observe a court order. There have been repeated allegations of police brutality against the protestors.

• Ministry of Defence (MOD) In December 2002, the UK Ministry of Defence was accused of using “dirty tricks” in its negotiations with BAE Systems over two controversial military contracts worth £5 billion. The MOD hired Financial Dynamics along with investment bank UBS Warburg, to assist it in its negotiations with BAE over cost overruns. BAE executives said the use of Warburg and FD constituted “utterly inappropriate” tactics, which were labeled by a BAE source talking to The Observer as “clearly dirty tricks.”

• British Energy Financial Dynamics is the PR company for British Energy, one of the key companies pushing for a nuclear revival. It was reportedly paid £1m for the contract.

People

• Jonathan Hawker Managing Director.

Contacts

Holborn Gate
26 Southampton Buildings
London, WC2A 1PB
www.fd.com