Private Banks

The income of Degroof Petercam Luxembourg’s private banking division has not been dented by the coronavirus crisis. To the contrary, results have been ‘above expectations’ thanks to a sharp increase in trading revenue, says its head Kris De Souter in an interview with Investment Officer.

Quintet Private Bank is planning to merge its European subsidiaries into one business unit based in Luxembourg. Approval has been requested from local supervisory authorities.

Contrary to the predictions of some that the pandemic will see a pull-back from globalisation, Jurgen Vanhoenacker, who heads the Sales and Wealth Structuring teams at Lombard International Assurance in Luxembourg, sees no signs of a reduced appetite for clients to live cross-border lives.

Luxembourg-based Quintet Private Bank  has opened a branch in Zurich, Switzerland. The opening follows the acquisition of the local Bank am Bellevue, the asset management arm of Bellevue Group AG, and the approval of the transaction by the regulatory authorities.

Equities – down. Fixed income – down. Precious metals – down. Commodities – down. These have been a strange, potentially frightening few weeks for all investors, including private bankers.

A Netflix-like environment that provides access to advice that is data-driven, personalized, continuous and preferrably subscription-based, is the future of wealth advice according to McKinsey.

KBL epb changes its name into Quintet Pan-European private banking group. The Luxembourg-based bank does this in order to better reflect its partnership approach in wealth management.

KBL European Private Bankers, established in 1949 in Luxembourg and currently with subsidiaries in more than 50 European cities, is from now on called ‘Quintet’, as mentioned in a press release issued by the bank. 

Luxembourg banks want to work together to create common standards on certain compliance-related functions, a survey by the Luxembourg Bankers’ Association ABBL among its member showed. 93% of respondents said they see such cooperation as ‘valuable for the financial services community’.

Luxembourg’s banks are not yet reaping the benefits of Brexit as Brexit-related additional costs are outstripping the rise in revenues. This has led to a year-on-year decline of 5.4% in banks’ profits in the third quarter of 2019, according to CSSF figures.

“In 2018, 21 banks active [in Luxemburg] for more than three years had a cost to income ratio in excess of 100%, and there could be more this year,” CSSF director general Claude Marx said recently. As in the rest of Europe, Luxembourg’s B2C banks in particular are under diverse pressures. Some tough strategic choices are required.