The boutique asset manager is the latest to confirm it will pick up the bill for investment research once the directive is transposed into law.

Unigestion has said it will cover the costs of investment research rather than pass them onto its clients ahead of a new wide-reaching European directive entering into force next year. 

The second iteration of the European Union’s Markets in Financial Instruments Directive, or MiFID II, takes effect on 3 January 2018 and requires money managers to “unbundle” the costs of investment research, separating them from trading and service fees. 

“Unigestion has opted to pay for all investment research from its own P&L as this approach is consistent with the firm’s core value of always putting its clients first,” the firm said in a statement. 

Unigestion is the latest in a string of money managers – including Vanguard, T Rowe Price, JP Morgan Asset Management and Aberdeen Standard Life - to absorb the cost of research once MiFID II is implemented.

The regulation has sparked debate about whether MiFID II will push smaller players to the wall, as some may not be able to pick up the bill and could lose business to larger rivals as a result of passing costs onto clients. 

And it seems that post-MiFID II research will not come cheap.

Barclays, for example, has quoted some small-and medium-sized clients $450,000 for firm-wide access to its premium research offering. At the other end of the spectrum is JP Morgan, the Wall Street giant proposing as little as $10,000 a year for equity research – the lowest price to emerge so far.