The art of wealth management

There’s much talk about high networth individuals but not much solid data on them.

The Bureau of Internal Revenue has in place the Large Taxpayers Service, which monitors corporate large taxpayers, but has no equivalent unit for individual large taxpayers. A task force created by Commissioner Rene Banez is currently working out the definition of who should be considered in the list of high income-earners and should be, therefore, included in the BIR’s list of individual large taxpayers.

The Securities and Exchange Commission regularly receives an updated statement of how much each of the country’s biggest corporations pays its top officers. The amount submitted to the SEC is, however, a consolidated figure that includes country club privileges and representation allowances.

Banks with special services for high networth individuals are not that much better off. They have a general profile of their wealthy clients but they can only guess at how big the market is.

The typical high networth individual is male, at least 50 years, working either in a business he or his family has put up or in a top 500 corporation, and with an investible or excess cash after meeting his regular expenses of a couple of million pesos.

Using the figures of John Naisbitt in his 1996 book entitled, "Megatrends Asia: Eight Asian Megatrends that are Shaping our World," that they supposedly control 70% of the national trade, the 3% of the country’s population who are ethnically Chinese also make up a disproportionately large percent of high networth individuals.

Distinct advantages

Through the years, banks have made wealthy clients feel special by rolling out coffee or tea, by appointing reserved tellers for their banking needs so they do not have to line up, by giving them a richly furnished area where they can hang out, and by assigning a bank officer to handle their investment portfolio.

"It’s different to invest for a business and to invest for yourself," said Citibank vice president and bank branching director Patrick Cheng. "In a business situation, you know the market well enough to take the risk. It’s a rational decision. It’s harder to make that same kind of quality decision when your retirement money is on the line."

In Cheng’s bank, wealthy clients who have at least $100,000 or its peso equivalent are enrolled in CitiGold Wealth Management Banking. Citibank pioneered priority banking in the country in the early 1990s, recognizing that high networth individuals have specialized financial needs.

"We were the first to focus on high networth individuals and we continue to provide our clients with a distinct advantage," said Cheng.

Such personalized service has evolved in the last decade from aesthetics and product pushing. Because many banks have since followed suit, Citibank has stayed ahead by continuously improving its service and its overall package.

In the last few months, CitiGold Priority Banking was relaunched in several Asian countries as CitiGold Wealth Management Banking. The Philippines was the seventh country to re-introduce the service in Asia.

CitiGold Wealth Management customizes the investment portfolio of each client, using a proprietary tool called, "Wealth Planner", that takes into account the client’s past investments, risk appetite and specific needs. The client is assigned a relationship manager and an associate (just in case the relationship manager is not available) and an investment expert. A CitiGold phone banking officer also forms part of the 24-hour team. As a bonus, a semi-annual investment review is given each client.

"What we give our clients is quality information which they can use to make more money for themselves. We make your money work harder for you," said Cheng. "At the end of the day, wealth management is not a science, it is an art."