London and Singapore may be the most glamorous high-finance centres, currently on the priority list of global wealth managers, but lessons can also be learned from journeys between less high-profile hubs.
The world of wealth management, is becoming an increasingly global one. The largest hubs are drawing in cross-border business from a broader range of territories. These financial centres include London, Geneva, Zurich, New York, Dubai, Singapore and Hong Kong.
The readership of PWM, launched in 2001 to cover this fast-changing industry, is also increasingly reflecting this global mindset. Yet sometimes a more local analogy can help describe our evolution.
In fact the journey we embarked on during 2023, which continues into 2024, can best be compared to a more simple 35 minute hop between the windswept British coastal towns of Ramsgate and Dover on Southeastern trains – if the beleaguered service is running on time.
From Ramsgate...
Why? Because Our 2023 achievements and milestones can be summarised by the RAMSGATE acronym.
R is for relaunch of our website, after extensive focus groups of readers and event attendees conducted by the FT’s marketing department.
A is for Awards, with the Global Private Banking Awards – masterminded by my colleague Elisa Trovato – receiving entries from 120 banks from a record number of 65 countries, culminating in a gala ceremony, staged by our colleagues from FT Live. The Wealth Tech Awards, for which we are currently gathering entries for 2024, are also gaining ground.
M is for megatrends, reshaping both business models and asset allocation in the wealth management world, which include:
S for sustainability, a topic overseen by our resident expert Elisa Trovato, whose analyses of green finance issues and indeed the ‘Blue economy’ associated with our oceans are among the best read articles on the PWMnet hub.
G for geopolitics, with conflicts in Ukraine, the Middle East and the stand-off between China and the US now seen as the number one issue for most family offices and their private bankers, and the key area of focus for our recently-launched FT Wealth Management Hub, in which PWM and sister title FT Adviser are major partners.
A is for Asian wealth management, a significant area of focus for PWM, as the lion’s share of clients and profits for private banks comes from this area, where we launched our flagship regional summit in 2023, which is taking off in terms of content, attendance and sponsorship for 2024.
T is for technology, which underlies all of our coverage on wealth, asset management, investments and the changing relationship between clients and banks, plus the topic of our Innovation in Wealth Management summit and associated awards, which we were delighted to have back on an in-person basis in 2023, and well-positioned for 2024. Tech is best represented in our Debrief and Startup show series of videos.
E is for our weekly email newsletter, compiled by my colleague and FT Specialist production boss Elliot Smither, with its fast expanding numbers of articles highlighted in the links, boosting engagement with PWM readers and FT Live event delegates.
... to Dover
So that is where we are coming from, but where are we heading to in 2024? After all, as mentioned earlier, this is a journey and we are travelling from Ramsgate to Dover
It is not so far, particularly when we look at the global reach of our industry, but is a significant journey in terms of topics, and also in the transformation of our offer. So what does DOVER stand for?
D is for demographics of Family Offices, the segment which is fastest increasing for private banks and wealth managers, being targeted by every major bulge bracket player, the key audience for whom we have launched the FT Wealth Management Hub. This is also the segment which all our partners particularly want to engage with in 2024.
O is for online engagement, the main metric chased by both PWM in our quest for reader views, and by the wealth managers boosting onboarding and ‘share of wallet’ of wealthy entrepreneurs.
V is for value creation in alternative investments, especially real assets, which are increasingly the main speciality which wealthy families are interested in and the key focus of our webinar partners and event sponsors
E is for energy transition, from dirty to clean, fossil to wind, solar and nuclear, from authoritarian state to liberal democracy, mirroring the investment patterns of global families and the private clients of key wealth managers.
R is for returns from fixed income in the ‘007 era’, bearing in mind the ‘bond is back’, as the interest rate cycle normalises and these traditional portfolio ballasts are once more in favour.
So although PWM staff are travelling around the world, physically and editorially, for our coverage, the journey from London to Singapore – today’s two major global poles of wealth management – also runs through the more humble, provincial seaside centres of Ramsgate and Dover.
