Long involved in finance, commerce, and the law, they are considered to be one of the principal families in the "cousinhood" of senior sephardic Anglo-Jewish families, the de facto Anglo-Jewish aristocracy: these influential families of the "cousinhood" include the d'Avigdor family, Sassoon family, Goldsmid family, Henriques family, Kadoorie family, Lousada family, Mazza Family, Montefiore, and Samuel family.
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The family left Spain in 1492, settling in France, the Netherlands and Italy, after the Alhambra Decree expelled Jews and Muslims from Spain, not long after the beginning of the Spanish Inquisition.
Subsequent to 1957, the firm was managed by Edward Mocatta, with involvement and shareholdings variously from Hambros Bank, Standard Chartered Bank, Henry Jarecki, Scotiabank, the Mocatta family and others.
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With Peter Hambro as Deputy Managing Director and Henry Jarecki as Chairman, the firm dealt in options and futures trading in precious metals and pursued bullion deals in Russia, the United States, South America, Switzerland, Mexico, Germany, China, Hungary, Australia, Japan and South Africa, and became the largest gold and silver counter party to the Soviet Union.
Sir Alan Abraham Mocatta (27 June 1907 – 1 November 1990) was an English judge, an expert on restrictive practices and a leader of the Spanish and Portuguese Jews of Britain.