Now he's back in the City, having bought, along with Greece's Alpha Trust, a 60 percent stake in Taylor Young Investment Management.

As the new chairman of the boutique-size private client fund manager ($620 million in assets), Twiston-Davies gamely expects to compete with behemoths like UBS and Credit Suisse that are also eager to cater to the investment needs of the rich. "The big boys tend to be process-driven and do not allow for individuality - among clients or fund managers," he says. "I meet a lot of very capable fund managers who are pretty cheesed off at the big houses. To them I would say, 'Join us.'" Taylor Young founder Christopher Taylor, 67, plans to stay on in the business for a couple more years.

Twiston-Davies, 50, has been looking for a challenge. "The children are at school, and though the view from the house in Herefordshire is lovely, I decided there were still things I wanted to achieve in the asset management business." His address book, a compendium of Who's Who and Burke's Peerage, should prove a boon to his new firm. Twiston-Davies' personal contacts spread far beyond the nouveaux of the City - his brother and fellow Old Radleian, Nigel, for instance, is a celebrated national hunt racehorse trainer, and his own daughter Antonia was one of the late Princess Diana's godchildren.