Family Offices

“We are a recognizable and accessible face for our clients. We are not product pushers but focus on concrete goals,” said Stefaan Vanden Berghe, CEO of Truncus. 

For several years, Truncus has been featured on Chambers & Partners’ list of top wealth managers, a prestigious ranking annually compiled based on the opinions of lawyers and tax consultants. Truncus is the only Belgian firm in this category.

High yield bonds are positioning themselves cautiously in the spotlight as recession fears recede and credit quality improves. While junk bonds perform best during periods of robust economic growth, a region that’s closely flirting with a recession is seen as having the most potential.

The road to hell is paved with good intentions. This applies also for well-intended regulations on environmental, social and governance. Because of the growth of ESG-focused investments in recent years, a new problem pops up: the risk of greenwashing. 

It has been about a year since Anthos Fund & Asset Management, the investment vehicle of the Dutch C&A family Brenninkmeijer, opened up as a multi-family office. For a traditionally closed stronghold it was quite a switch to fully open the doors, said top executive Jacco Maters (photo) in an interview with Investment Officer. 

Family wealth managers are more and more challenged by demands placed on them by digitalisation, increasingly stringent regulations and complex cross-border taxation requirements. It’s an environment that encourages some wealthy families to join forces with others and enter their investments into a Multi-Family Office business, moving away from the traditional single-family office. “It’s the correct answer to the market.”

Private markets are no longer the exclusive preserve of large institutional investors. A round of questions to Dutch asset managers point to an influx of families and high-net-worth individuals - or HNWIs - as private equity becomes more widely available as an asset class. Their increased appetite for alternative investments is also noted in Luxembourg.

As of this week asset owners can turn to Anthos Fund & Asset Management. The asset manager places high demands on the intrinsic motivation of prospective clients, bearing in mind the original values of its owners, the Brenninkmeijer family, one of the richest in the Netherlands and well known for its C&A retail fashion chain. 

The average European family office has invested 16% of their assets sustainably. This is much more than their counterparts in the rest of the world, according to a survey by Blackrock.

The year 2018 saw a 37% jump in the number of worldwide single family offices to no fewer than 7,300. Altogether family offices manage assets of nearly 6 trillion dollars.