The account, worth approximately £5.3m a year, will move to EY from 1 January 2018, subject to approval at the 2018 annual general meeting. The fee is split between £3m for audit work, £800,000 for audit-related services and £1.5m for non-audit services.

PwC will remain the group's auditors for the financial years ending 31 December 2016 and, subject to their reappointment at the 2017 Annual General Meeting, 31 December 2017. It has held the post since 1959, meaning that by the time it hands over to EY, it will have held the post for 59 years.

Shroders initially awarded the audit to KPMG in 2013, but the firm was unable to take up the post after admitting it ‘did not meet the regulatory requirements for independence for all relevant group companies'.

Schroders is the latest of a number of large UK corporates to choose EY as auditor. Other recent examples include the RELX group, Royal Dutch Shell, Royal Bank of Scotland, Wesleyan, Foreign & Colonial, Sainsbury's, Sainsbury Bank, The London Stock Exchange Group, The Co-operative Bank, Sage Group, Land Securities, the BBC, Dyson and the Audit Commission.

Shroders' annual report is available here.