Wealth Managers

Services, not fees, are increasingly driving client decisions in wealth management and private banking, a leading US consultancy has concluded in its latest study of clients in the high-net-worth (HNW) and ultra-high-net-worth (UHNW) market segments.

Major domestic Luxembourg bank Spuerkeess will move the majority of its fund portfolio to Euroclear FundsPlace as part of its effort to streamline and cut costs in its fund business, the bank has announced this week.

The bank said it “has decided to move away from transfer agents and centralise the distribution and execution services of its funds.”

Euroclear’s funds platform has started to manage the lion’s share of the Spuerkeess portfolio  and “collect trailer fees on external custodians” as well.

Luxembourg’s CSSF financial regulator on 20 February announced that in late 2023, it had imposed a nearly half-million euro administrative fine on Mizuho Trust & Banking (Luxembourg) S.A.

The 17 November 2023 fine of 444,400 euros was imposed for non-compliance with professional obligations under Luxembourg’s financial sector law relating to governance and IT organisation. 

Interest in investing in private markets, private credit in particular, may have surged, but that growth is just the beginning. “We see a structural shift towards private credit,” says Joan Solotar, global head of Private Wealth Solutions at Blackstone.

Private banks are navigating challenges in discerning customers’ sustainability preferences, hindered by a lack of common definitions and necessary data. The struggle persists as new legislation under Mifid 2, effective since August 2022, mandates including sustainability factors in suitability tests. Oxford Risk’s survey among wealth managers reveals industry-wide difficulties in implementation.

Protracted discussions over the EU’s new regime for European Long Term Investment Funds, known as Eltifs, are delaying the launch of new funds for these private asset investments.

Berlin-based Moonfare said it plans to create a dedicated secondary liquidity mechanism that enables retail investors in Eltif 2.0 funds to unwind their holdings before the fund matures.

More than two thirds of fund selectors see active fund management as key to outperforming in the current year, a reflection of its growing importance in uncertain markets, the latest Natixis 2024 Fund Selector Outlook Survey shows.

The survey uncovered a strategic pivot among wealth managers, who over the past decade have largely favoured passively managed index funds. However, 45% of fund selectors attribute the outperformance of passive investments to a decade of artificially low interest rates and minimal inflation, conditions that are changing. 

Investment specialists are singing from a common hymn book in predicting the world is on a path to lower inflation and treasury yields, though they carefully call attention to possible transitional effects, Investment Officer heard while covering two recent investment events in Luxembourg hosted by J. Safra Sarasin and Capital Group.

This week’s overview of transfers, appointments, promotions and other people news includes updates from Fidelity, Alma LED Luxembourg, Fundcraft and Better Finance.

Christine Baalham and Tom Record

Christine Baalham and Tom Record have been appointed as co-portfolio managers in the global equity team at Fidelity International. Veteran portfolio manager Jeremy Podger will transition to a senior advisory role in March 2024.