Swiss banking and the financial market as a whole used to be in sync. No longer, says Vontobel boss Zeno Staub.
The Swiss financial market has entered a new era, according to Zeno Staub, the chief executive officer of Bank Vontobel. In an earlier period, banks distinguished themselves through their founding years only and hardly at all through their product offerings. «Swiss Private Banking since … – 1780, 1796 or 1805 is no more,» Staub said at a media event in Geneva.
For a bank to be successful today, it has to differentiate itself from rivals. That’s why the interests of players on the Swiss financial market vary hugely, making it more demanding to represent the industry as a whole.
A Strong Home Market
The development has its advantages though. Swiss banking is not only strong in the cross-border-business, but also in retail banking, in the business with corporate clients and small investors in Switzerland.
«The financial market only has a decent chance to be successful in future if it has a large enough home market,» Staub said. And this is the case in Switzerland. About 800 billion Swiss francs in pension provision funds and an equal amount of money belonging to wealthy citizens combine to provide a large enough volume to maintain a cluster of competence.
On Course in Asia
London, Boston and parts of New York enjoyed similarly beneficial conditions as Switzerland, according to Staub, who surprisingly didn’t mention Asian hubs in the same vein. Vontobel is expecting to expand in the Far East, in particular in structured products, which Vontobel has started emitting in Hong Kong in September. Staub didn’t provide a figure for how successful the first weeks had been, but said that the bank was «well on course».
The development on the Swiss market is reflected in the job market. Some companies are reducing their workforce or are developing plans to do so, while others are pursuing an active hiring strategy. Among them Vontobel, which almost «aggressively» is looking for talent, according to headhunters. Staub said that the bank was interested in hiring relationship advisers or even whole teams.
Money From the Middle East
Lionel Pilloud, the head of the Geneva branch and responsible for French-speaking Europe and the Middle East, told finews.com that he doubled the number of staff with direct contact to customers over the past 18 months and that he intended to continue expanding.
Vontobel currently employs about 20 relationship managers in Geneva and in total has some 60 members of staff in the city. The bank manages more than 5 billion Swiss francs in assets from the Geneva branch, half on behalf of institutional clients, half for private customers.
Assets belonging to citizens based in neighboring France have declined over the past years, while customers from the Middle East generated a steady increase in money, according to Pilloud. He therefore is concentrating his hiring plans on relationship managers with a corresponding specialization.
Developing New Strenghts
The development also seems to confirm that the financial market is defending its position despite the manifold pressure it was exposed to over the past years. The key was to develop new fields of expertise.
