Credit Suisse’s Asia chief Helman Sitohang notes that effective institutionalization and tedious account-opening processes are making assets significantly stickier even when relationship managers leave the bank, adding that even clients are frankly tired of moving around.
«Because of our model, our relationship with our clients becomes a lot more sticky,» Sitohang said in a «Business Times» report (behind paywall), noting that asset outflows following relationship manager exits have been greatly reduced due to the attractiveness of the overall platform, such as access to investment and product specialists.
In addition, strict compliance standards and cumbersome account-opening processes have put off clients. «Clients are actually tired of moving banks,» Sitohang said.
Not a Winning Proposition
As a result of new market dynamics and a trimmed front office to about 600 private bankers, Sitohang said the bank can now «pay competitively» but warns against an unhealthy culture of bidding. «Just bidding up talent for the sake of bidding up, I don't think it's a winning proposition,» he explained. «And frankly, I don't think clients and the regulators appreciate it.»
The report also highlighted Credit Suisse’s success in focusing on becoming the entrepreneur’s bank in Asia and Sitohang underlines that the ultra-high net worth skew of such a business gives it some public relations advantage that spills over to the high net worth segment.
More Visibility
«In the ultra-high-net-worth space, there is more visibility on deals,» Sitohang said, referring to stock or bond issuances from businesses belonging to wealthy families in the region, some of which have publicly commented on being a Credit Suisse client. «I think that kind of visibility inspires a lot of the high net worth individuals to say: 'This is a very interesting bank who understands the entrepreneurs’.»
