Georg von Wattenwyl, CEO of Vontobel Singapore and Chairman of the Swiss Chamber of Commerce and Industry in Singapore on the Lion City’s attractiveness, the business with external asset managers and family offices, and the new «investerest» platform.

Georg von Wattenwyl, what makes Singapore attractive for Vontobel?

Singapore is the most important financial center in Southeast Asia and, thanks to its stability, neutrality and well-developed financial center, manages a lot of assets both from near and far abroad. Traditional private banking is well established and has been growing rapidly for years.

A more recent trend, however, is that more and more wealthy families are restructuring their assets and choosing a setup that is independent of the banks. This is partly due to the increasingly complicated regulatory and tax environment, but also to the fact that the changing geopolitical environment poses new challenges to asset allocation and management and that clients no longer want to be the link to their usually multiple banking relationships themselves.

«Our work with external asset managers and family offices is an important pillar in Vontobel’s business strategy»

In addition, they also seek access to so-called «non-bankable» assets, which often run through a network of independent asset managers. For very wealthy domestic and foreign families (from S$50 million assets) with their own single-family office in Singapore, Singapore offers interesting tax opportunities.

How important is Vontobel’s work with external asset managers and family offices?

Our work with external asset managers and family offices is an important pillar in Vontobel’s business strategy. It is part of our DNA, so to speak, and combines our core competencies of wealth management, asset management, and investment banking in an integrated business model.

Unlike many other banks, our work with external asset managers and family offices is not a branch of wealth management. It is an independent investment banking division. This provides our clients with direct access to specialists, and it does not produce any conflicts of interest in our client service.

«Assets under management have increased more than fivefold since the financial crisis in only ten years»

This area has also seen very strong growth in recent years. Assets under management have increased more than fivefold since the financial crisis in only ten years. In addition to the advantages that were already mentioned, the reasons for this are our high level of advisory and investment expertise, a consistently implemented platform strategy, and our capability of efficiently producing our own specific investment solutions customized to individual needs.

What infrastructure can your clients use?

Our range of services is made up of our expert platforms in addition to an international booking and production platform based in Switzerland with access to 125 markets worldwide. It is always about providing our clients with services that they can use to create the best solutions for their clients and for themselves.

«investerest» adds another platform to our family of platforms. It focuses on the segment of thematic and investment strategies and offers investment managers and professional investors an electronic meeting place. We not only want to show entirely new ways for professional investors to find the right solutions for their clients.

«Modern family offices are not interested in making compromises when it comes to liquidity»

We are also offering our independent asset managers a platform they can use to securitize their own investment strategies and make them available to a broad segment of professional investors.

What is the incentive for thematic investments?

Investing has a lot to do with strategic allocation and tactics. One of the needs of institutionalized assets for rich individuals is to effectively benefit from trends in a diversified way with reaction times that are as short as possible. Modern family offices are not interested in making compromises when it comes to liquidity.

«Strategy ideas can be implemented in an index»

Often, specific elements also have to be taken into account, such as sustainability criteria or systematic sector specifications. Actively Managed Certificates (AMC) offer an effective way of securitizing theme investments, including those across asset classes.

Strategy ideas can be efficiently implemented in an index with reduced administrative effort and made accessible to professional investors. AMCs can refer directly to this index as the underlying. The strategy is the responsibility of the index sponsor.

Georg von Wattenwyl, 51, is a financial industry veteran with over 20 years of experience with leading firms in the banking and finance sector. He brings with him a wide breadth of corporate and association experience, having been appointed as Managing Director and Head EAM Asia and Global Head Family Offices at Vontobel earlier this year. He is newly based in Singapore and CEO of Vontobel Singapore.