Standard Chartered to expand Gulf wealth management team

Standard Chartered plans to expand its wealth management team in the Gulf nations, a top executive said, unfazed by an escalating Iran war that has prompted some wealthy clients to move their assets to other centres.

The bank is looking to add more relationship managers for wealthy individuals in Dubai and may also expand its presence in Abu Dhabi, said Raymond Ang, Standard Chartered’s global head of private and affluent banking.

“GCC, for sure, is a white spot for us,” Ang said, without giving specific headcount or investment details. The bank’s UAE team focuses on serving wealthy non-resident Indians and Pakistanis.

Stantard Chartered, which has more than 100 private bankers and onshore retail banking relationship managers in Dubai, has recently hired two teams to cater to GCC clients from Dubai and could add more bankers there, Ang said.

The Gulf expansion plan of the bank, which gets the bulk of its revenue from Asia, Africa, and the Middle East, comes amid a clouded outlook for the Middle East amid the Iran war that started in February.

In the wake of US and Israeli strikes on Iran, some wealthy Asian clients sought to move assets held in Dubai closer to home, particularly to Singapore, as regional tensions grew, Reuters reported in March.

Ang said that the Middle East tensions have had a “negligible” impact on the bank’s wealth operations, even after the bank booked a $190 million first-quarter credit charge related to the crisis.

Further reading:

• Drop in UAE monetary supply poses challenge for banks
• Gulf’s wealthy rebalance portfolios during war
• US asset manager has loaned $10bn to Gulf investors during war

Outflows of assets from the Middle East centres surged in the first month of the war, halved in the second, and have normalised since, he said, adding Standard Chartered has also seen inflows from rivals that lack diversified wealth booking centres.

Standard Chartered has asset booking centres in Singapore, Hong Kong, Jersey and the UAE.

“In aggregate, we kept all of our clients’ money,” he said. “We are net beneficiaries.”

The bank’s wealth unit last week posted a record quarterly income of about $1 billion, while net new money tripled from a year earlier to a record $18 billion in the first three months, according to its earnings.

London-headquartered Standard Chartered launched a plan in 2024 to bolster its wealth management business, pledging investments of $1.5 billion to boost fee income from affluent and private banking clients.