P eter Hargreaves is a British billionaire who co-founded the financial services company Hargreaves Lansdown. Born in Lancashire, he began his career as a chartered accountant before moving into sales roles. He identified a gap in the market for providing investment information and services directly to retail investors, who were often overlooked by traditional financial institutions. In 1981, he co-founded Hargreaves Lansdown with Stephen Lansdown, initially operating from a spare bedroom in Bristol.

The company started by providing information to clients about unit trusts and tax planning. It gradually expanded its services to become a direct-to-consumer investment platform, allowing individuals to manage their own portfolios of stocks, funds, and pensions. This direct-to-consumer model, which bypassed traditional financial advisors, was revolutionary at the time and proved immensely popular. Hargreaves Lansdown grew into the UK's largest retail investment platform, with hundreds of billions of pounds in assets under administration. The company went public on the London Stock Exchange in 2007. Hargreaves stepped down from his role as CEO in 2010 and left the board in 2015, but he remains the company's largest shareholder.