Operational challenges ahead for wealth management firms
The majority of wealth management firms will prioritise improved operational efficiency and client asset protection in the next 12 months. This is one of the findings of a Clearstream-commissioned survey among wealth management firms conducted by Goodacre, the leading specialist consultancy for the securities industry in the UK.
The survey and report ‘The Wealth Landscape: The Manager’s Perspective’ examines how wealth managers and private banks cope with the multitude of new regulatory requirements and continuous market reforms. Investment performance, client service and distribution, client asset protection and operational efficiency are all seen as critically important.
Key findings
The majority of survey respondents stated increasing regulatory pressure and escalating costs as the main obstacles to overcome in the future.
- Continuing increase in regulatory requirements, a lack of investment into the post-trade arena and often highly manual processing hubs has led wealth managers to apply a much greater focus on potential risk exposures and inefficiencies embedded in parts of their current operational models and custody networks.
- More than two thirds of survey respondents stated that using a single custodian and fund processing provider for all asset classes could lower costs and generate efficiencies. Enhanced customer asset protection was also seen as a benefit of using a single provider.
- Survey results indicate that post-trade processes will likely become an outsourced utility and replace most of the current ‘back office’ establishments which still rely on highly manual processes. Such setups can free resources to focus on business expansion rather than operational processes.