Winners rationale

2020 will go down in the annals of Julius Baer’s history as a watershed year for its Global Indians offering. Yes, the Swiss wealth manager has covered this client segment on a dedicated basis since 2007, but astute strategic planning with a commitment from the top and significant investments into the franchise — especially since 2014 — are today bearing fruits indicative of business, whose value proposition is as clear and compelling as it is effective, and whose model is sustainable.

Indeed, Julius Baer’s Global Indians proposition draws on the core strengths of the group and is refined to directly address the requirements of its clientele: a globally integrated setup across relevant booking hubs, including India, with seamless, coordinated coverage; holistic wealth management services; and a truly open architecture products platform with a curated offering for the Global Indians segment.

Crucially, the bank’s build-out of its Global Indians franchise in recent years has progressed hand-in-hand with the build-out of its domestic India business which, in and of itself, stands as the country’s largest foreign private bank by a number of measures and a rare example of a global wealth manager that is increasing its commitment to the onshore market.

What is important here is that this improved onshore and offshore synergy — under a single point of leadership and with a single team-based approach — is unlocking relationships and business (including via a high rate of referrals) that draw on the strength of this seamless offshore-onshore connectivity and international network of experts, in turn driving robust growth across all business KPIs, including new accounts and NNM flows which, in 2020, increased by a remarkable triple-digit percentage from an already credible level.

Of course, such success would not be possible without clients being sure of the bank’s commitment to its Indian Subcontinent and Global Indians (NRI) franchise. And that commitment is evident in Julius Baer’s sustained investments into the business.

In 2020, Julius Baer further reinforced its Global Indians team, adding a vastly experienced group head and a team of bankers in Hong Kong, and new NRI investment counsellors in Dubai and Singapore to strengthen engagement between its segment-dedicated RMs and Global Indian clients.

And Julius Baer added to its ‘Indian-flavoured’ solutions suite, including with yield-seeking products which garnered significant and consistent contributions from Global Indian client contributions in a challenging year, underscoring the bank’s success at maintaining high client engagement and activity levels via Global India-specific virtual events, regular markets and product specialist briefings, and, above all else, a coordinated team-based approach to client coverage.

Julius Baer and its Global Indian clients are today reaping the benefits of years of work and investments into a franchise whose proposition is as unique as it is effective. Julius Baer is Asian Private Banker’s Best Private Bank — Global Indians for 2020.