Asia’s high net-worth individuals (HNWIs) — people with $1 million or more in investable assets — are younger than their western counterparts. Forty-one percent of Asia-Pacific’s HNWIs are 45 or under versus a global average of 17 percent, according to Capgemini and Merrill Lynch.
One thing is for certain: believing that what has worked for wealthy clients in Europe or the US in the past will work in Asia, too, would be a big mistake. A report from Standard Chartered Private Bank concludes that those who target this elite customer group will have to try harder as these clients will be less willing to part with their hard-earned cash.
As Asia emerges as the world’s largest wealth region, the one question foremost on the minds of all private bankers should be: what does a typical Asian client look like? In Standard Chartered Private Bank — with more than two-thirds of our assets under management originating from Asia — we are seeing a new generation of Asian clients who stand out very clearly from those in other regions of the world.
Their expectations and outlook are different, hence they need different things from us.
Much of this comes down to demographics. Asia’s high net-worth individuals (HNWIs) — people with $1 million or more in investable assets — are younger than their western counterparts. Forty-one percent of Asia-Pacific’s HNWIs are 45 or under versus a global average of 17 percent, according to Capgemini and Merrill Lynch. This means they are still creating and growing their wealth, as opposed to western HNWIs who tend to focus more on wealth preservation.
63% are business owners, mostly first or second generation
Another important difference is that a greater proportion of Asian HNWIs (63 percent in the case of our clients) are business owners, mostly first or second generation.
They have earned their money the hard way, and are more reluctant to let others manage it, meaning that the private banking model applied for decades in the West may not work for them. Instead, many Asian clients prefer a much more hands-on approach, talking to their bank more often and looking for a faster turnover within their portfolios.
Asian HNWIs also tend to be more ambitious — obvious perhaps given the higher returns they will have seen in the past couple of years. We see the same trend among Asia’s entrepreneurs, the region’s future rich.
The 2012 Futurewealth survey, by Standard Chartered Private Bank, Scorpio Partnership and SEI, shows that entrepreneurs in Asia set themselves considerably higher wealth goals and expect to get there faster than their counterparts in the West.
via Asia’s new rich.
Survey of 3,300 HNWIS concludes redefining the wealth management customer journey is critical to success
Scorpio Partnership, Standard Chartered Private Bank and SEI announced today the launch of the 2012 Futurewealth Report: A Customer Revolution. This third worldwide Futurewealth survey captures insight from 3,300 high-net-worth individuals and finds wealth creators in all regions are less confident about their ability to make money in the coming year.
The report concludes that those who target this elite customer group will have to try harder as these clients will be less willing to part with their hard-earned cash.The report is part of the ongoing Futurewealth Project undertaken by Scorpio Partnership and sponsored by Standard Chartered Private Bank.
The project is a long-term initiative to uncover the attitudes and expectations of wealth creators around the world. In spite of negative sentiment, this year there was an 87% growth in the number of highnet-worth consumers who took part in the survey. Overall more than 8,000 high-net-worth individuals have now taken part in the Futurewealth project, making it one of the largest continuous research studies on this valuable but hard-toreach customer group.
The Futurewealth Project has been tracking the wealth confidence of international wealth creators since 2009 asking how much they made in the last year and how much they expect to make in the next year. On a 100-point scale, confidence for the future has slipped 10 points in the last year, even though actual performance was better this year than last.
Download the complete study here
