JPMorgan plans to expand private banking staff for Latin America
JPMorgan Chase bank plans to increase the number of employees in private banking for Latin America by about 25 percent next year, prioritizing expansion in the segment that serves clients with U$5 million to US$25 million invested with the bank.
The hires would add about 100 people to JPMorgan’s private banking teams serving the region from offices in Miami, New York, Houston, and Geneva, cities where the bank has about 430 employees dedicated to that business.
“We have been hiring very aggressively in this segment and will continue to do so,” Edinardo Figueiredo Figueiredo, JPMorgan’s president of private banking for Latin America, said in an interview.
“There is still a lot of room to win.”
JPMorgan, which is already the leader in private banking for Latin Americans, is gaining market share as political uncertainty has convinced many clients to diversify overseas, according to Figueiredo.
JPMorgan has about US$180 billion in Latin American client wealth under management, and about 10% of that is in Geneva.
Credit Suisse clients withdrew as much as CHF84 billion (about US$90 billion) from the bank during the first weeks of the quarter amid continuing concerns about the bank’s restructuring efforts.
This is potentially the worst exodus since the financial crisis.
Banks worldwide have been competing for wealthy clients, bolstering their advisory and lending businesses to capture more assets.
Citigroup combined its asset management and private banking units under a single executive early last year, and Bank of America said in September that it formed a new group to expand product offerings for affluent clients.
In 2020, JPMorgan began closing its local private banking business in Latin American countries like Brazil and Mexico, ending a decades-long effort to compete locally after deciding it didn’t have the scale to be profitable.
It now serves Latin American clients only from offices outside the region.
Most of the fortunes under management, about US$65 billion, are from Mexican clients.
Most wealthy Brazilians invest their money locally and have US$31 billion abroad invested at JPMorgan, Figueiredo said.
The bank hired 50 people last year and this year increased the Latin American private banking team with 20 new bankers in Miami, Figueiredo said.
The bank is also benefiting from a trend among wealthy Latin Americans to become “super-global,” he said, citing a Latin American family with apartments in Italy, Paris, and the UK.
While Brazilians usually buy real estate in Miami, New York, or Portugal, he said clients from Spanish-speaking countries are buying properties in Madrid, adding that the bank held an event with more than 120 participants.
JPMorgan will see a 20 percent revenue increase in its private banking business this year in Latin America after raising about US$13 billion in net new money. Last year, it had net inflows of US$23 billion, he said.
“Considering the inflow of new money and gains from rising interest rates and strong brokerage activity, we are having the best year since 2010,” Figueiredo said.
With information from Bloomberg in linea
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