A discreet breed of financial management firm has sprung up to cater to Asia's super-rich as their fortunes grow.
The firms, known as multi-family offices, provide an alternative to private banks in helping ultra-high-net-worth families manage their riches across generations.
One of the newer entries here is London-based SandAire, which opened a three-person Singapore office three years ago and now serves a handful of clients in the region.
Family businesses dominate the Asian landscape, while the robust level of initial public offerings and mergers and acquisitions in recent years have created more liquid wealth for entrepreneurs, said SandAire chairman Alex Scott yesterday.
"The multi-family offering is maturing in Europe, but is still very new in this region," he added.
SandAire Singapore managing director Nadav Lehavy estimates that there are only about 200 single and multi-family offices in Asia.
Exact numbers are hard to pin down because these firms tend to guard their clients' privacy fiercely.
Theirs is a small and exclusive clientele. At SandAire, for example, a relationship starts when a client commits a minimum of US$50 million (S$68 million).
The firm's clients are its sole source of income, and fees are negotiated upfront instead of on a performance basis. Unlike private banks, SandAire does not sell its own financial products and so can highlight its independent advice when it comes to asset allocation.
Tailor-made investment opportunities are another key offering.
"The global asset allocation piece is critical and the most important driver of returns, but at the margin, we can and do access idiosyncratic opportunities for (our clients)," said Mr Scott.
He has seen clients - many of whom are entrepreneurs - become more enthusiastic about buying direct holdings in companies, both listed and unlisted, over the past five years.
"There's always a push from clients to have some really tangible (investments) for them to be able to talk about," he said.
One such mandate led SandAire to become a holder of IP Group, a British-based company that helps universities turn their research departments' ideas into real businesses.
This article was first published on April 17, 2015.
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