Asia is growing at a breakneck pace and creating billionaires at the fastest rate than anywhere else in the world. The hyper growth is expected to continue for the foreseeable future, and it is hardly a surprise that some of the financial behemoths are trying to chase the ultra-rich clients in the continent with tailored services. In a new development, banking giant HSBC has decided to pitch their services to the richest of the rich in the continent and to that end, it is creating a team that is going to specifically cater to ultra high net individuals in Asia. According to Tan Meng, who is the head of private global banking at the bank, HSBC has already earmarked two top executives who are going to be in charge of this team, and the bank plans to employ around 700 private banking professionals in the region. That being said, it is unknown how many employees will specifically work for the aforementioned team.
The team will only take on clients who have a net worth of at least $30 million and considering the pace at which the continent is churning out millionaires, HSBC can hope to draw in plenty of clients. For many years, the Greater China region has been one of the biggest sources of private banking revenue for HSBC, but the bank’s CEO now wants to expand into the rest of the continent. Plenty of private banking divisions of major banks and wealth managers are expecting to boost revenues through their services in Asia.
During the course of an interview, Tan added, “If we’re going to be able to achieve the ambitious growth plans that we’ve got, clearly we need to be able to address the ultra-high net worth segment very well.” Although, the slowdown in China, the largest economy in the continent, has had a negative impact on the region as a whole, there is no reason to think that the richest people in the continent would not continue to grow in the years to come and hence, this particular bet from HSBC is certainly that has a lot of promise. According to a report published by Knight Frank, the number of billionaires in the continent is going to explode in the years to come and by 2023; it will rise by as much as 27%. Considering the fact that the biggest names in banking like JP Morgan, Citi and Goldman Sachs are already running similar operations in Asia, it was perhaps just a matter of time before HSBC entered the fray.