Customer Reviews

Global Private Banking and Wealth Management: The New Realities (The Wiley Finance Series)

5 star:		(4)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

Fantastic book. Genuinely global perspective and bang up to date. includes difficult-to-get data on industry economics and benchmarks, a fascinating future perspective on industry growth, and incisive analysis of a vast range of surveys and reports that I (a financial services strategy veteran) never knew existed. Very clear and well written. Invaluable for helping our organisatn develop a wealth management strategy.

I read this book in 2006, when it was published, because I am a consultant in the field it describes, and need to follow industry trends. As I review this book in 2010, it would be too easy to criticize the conclusions found here based on our 20/20 hindsight of the massive industry crisis that transpired since. Therefore, let instead me start with another aspect of the book that I found troubling at the time I read it. Unwittingly, the authors have produced an amazing demonstration of how many people within the financial industry are utterly incapable of producing readable prose. Entire sections of this book read like extended PowerPoints, complete with bullet points, with little attempt at constructing a logical flow of sentences. Acronyms are used extensively, often without definitions, which may be passable for someone who is already familiar with industry parlance, but is entirely self-defeating if the purpose is to introduce the reader to the subject matter. To make matters worse, the book averages about one misspelling or syntactical error per page, and sometimes you'll find three per page (I kid you not). This is the kind of writing that would earn you a C- in a college English class. The publishing house obviously rushed this to market with no editorial oversight and without even running it through a spellchecker.

Now, if you are willing to disregard the grammatical errors, and are already somewhat familiar with the industry, this book does serve a purpose. It provides useful information about the basic structure of the sector. But, what about the analysis of the industry's future that constitutes the all-important conclusion of the book? Here we find that the quality of the writing reflects the quality of the thinking. Overall, the authors paint a rosy picture of the future, with no inkling of the fact that the banking industry, by the time of writing, had already dug itself into the worst crisis since the Great Depression. Consequently, once the reader moves beyond the basic information to the projected sector rankings and other data, he or she will find that most of it is of little use. Many of the industry leaders extolled here have either disappeared altogether or been forced to merge. The analysis of international developments would need to be largely rewritten, because, even at the time of this writing, the global environment is evolving in dramatic ways that were not envisaged by the authors. So much for the "New Realities" in the book's subtitle.

Global Private Banking can now be read much more usefully as a historical artifact, as evidence of the optimistic, self-congratulating state of mind of the majority of financial sector managers at a critical juncture in time, than as an analysis piece. The fact that the book was really written by industry people for industry people created every disincentive to question the fundamentals of the industry, in other words, to skip the very kind of analysis that was most urgently needed.

At each level, starting with language and ending with substantive analysis, the quality of this tome is such an embarrassment that it plays right into the hands of criticisms that gained currency after the meltdown. If this is the quality of the thinking to be found in the industry that plays the central role within the economy, our industry, the public has every right to be nervous. My suggestion is that it would be nice if these individuals actually bothered to pick up some books from the literature and philosophy sections of their favorite bookseller and learned what makes writing and critical thinking work. It's not going to solve many problems in the short run, but along the way, they may also bump into the concept of civic responsibility, and find it interesting.

A book any banking professionnal should read to understand the stategics underlying the wealth management industrie.

I have just started my career in the Wealth Mgt industry, and I was looking for material to help me accelerate my learning curve. Mr. Maude's compilation of industry fundamentals was a great foundation to build upon. The book clearly goes thru the fragmented market, key players, products and down to regional and cultural differences of clients. Refrences and sources of much of the information in the book came from CapGemini/Merril Lynch, Boston Consulting Group, McKinsey, Smith Barney and more. With the feel of an MBA textbook, the intent is clearly to educate the reader.

In this lengthy and detailed survey of the private banking and wealth management business, David Maude offers a picture of the current condition of the industry and provides historical detail about how the very wealthy manage their affairs. His objective and balanced chapters examine the challenges confronting the business today, as client relationships change, and he offers a vision for the future. This book probably belongs on the shelf of those in the private banking and wealth management business, or those rich enough to need the advice. We recommend it to anyone with an interest in how other people's money is managed.

If you are experienced wealth manager of just starting the carrier in this book you will find everything you need - from most recent trends in the market to client profiling, segmentation to business structures. That is the book I was looking for ages. My respect and acknowledgement to the author.