Monday, February 22, 2010

Britons Never Will be Slaves...but Will Always be Taxpayers

Robert Gaines-Cooper. A name that may become infamous to all Britons abroad.

If all this resident, domicile, non-dom, nonresident, 91 days and IR20 stuff wasn't heady enough already, the courts have basically re-confirmed that the HMRC is almighty:
http://www.international-adviser.com/lwm/article/1249

If you have any ties to the UK and are (or thought you were) playing the non-res game, go see your UK tax adviser.

[Edit: and should you be caught of the wrong side of the tax law, you will be a poster boy for the HMRC under their new name & shame campaign: http://www.ft.com/cms/s/2/5cd320c8-26e4-11df-8c08-00144feabdc0.html]

Putting the Fun in Dysfunctional

The UK law firm of Herbert Smith has the marketing machine rolling recently including a "new" private client practice in Hong Kong: http://asia.legalbusinessonline.com/news/breaking-news/herbies-targets-wealth-management-industry-with-new-hong-kong-practice/40419

Herbies is certainly not new in Asia but was traditionally more of a corporate law firm and may have be only familiar to those on the corporate trustee side. Now they have set the hounds loose hoping to drum up contentious trust and estate business.

And if Herbies is successful, then that means trouble for somebody. Their raison d'ĂȘtre is to stir up trouble: sue or be sued. They are the antithesis of family governance for a family that stays happily together means no business for them. They require dysfunctional, and somewhat greedy families. They are looking for the respective sons and daughters of Hidetora Ichimonji and King Lear.

As the patriarch system of wealth in Asia is slowly dying out and being replaced by by western educated 2nd and 3rd generations, "issues" are more often settled in court rather than the old school way of being settled out of court. "All under heaven" is being replaced by fractional and warring family camps. Gentlemen's agreements are now replaced by writs. Appeasing the old man is now being replaced by marginalizing the old man.

If you're a trust/estate beneficiary or feel you should have been one, call them.

If you're a trustee or executor, avoid them or put them on retainer so they can't be used against you.

Thursday, February 11, 2010

Don't Let The Door Hit You On The Way Out

Don't really have a point to this entry but.....Kevin Horrocks has left Merrill Lynch-BOA. Bear with me...there is an Asian connection.

Unless you work in Marina Bayfront, you probably don't know Kevin. Kevin used to head up ML's ITWS (International Trust & Wealth Structuring - I think that's what it is) out of Switzerland. As big of a fish in the bank trust industry as they come. Surely paid well too.

I suspect that this was an unpleasant divorce but how do they announce his departure? Just a footnote to the announcement of the appointment of his successor. That's life. That's also how many jobs/tour-of-duty/careers end. No big send off, no congratulations, no thanks, no fanfare, no pat on the back for years of hard work, no nothing. In fact Kevin got his name in which is more than most people.

Just to show how old I am, Kevin used to peddle trusts out at Credit Suisse in Singapore. This is before they even had a licensed trust company in Singapore.

Wednesday, February 10, 2010

Put Your Money Where Your Mouth Is

Jimmy Lee is head of Head of Asia for Clariden Leu. He should be no stranger to anyone in the PB/WM arena in South Asia having worked for many players for many years. Another chronic job hopper. Jimmy is a fine banker and I'm sure he and Chit will keep CL relevant and this should not be construed as a personal attack but rather more of keeping track of the politicians and their election promises.

I love it when senior banking officials come out and talk about how he feels "that clients are increasingly demanding a comprehensive range of services that go far beyond traditional wealth management and the provision of investment advice. This spectrum of services spans financial and tax advice, succession and inheritance planning..........." We trust people love that sexy talk.
http://www.financeasia.com/News/166669,jimmy-lee-from-clariden-leu-discusses-asian-private-banking.aspx

The problem isn't that they are not aware of the market potential for "tax, succession and inheritance planning", but rather how to implement a strategy and course of action. Exercise and eating a balanced diet are known contributors to good health. How many people actually have a plan to exercise and eat right? How often are we led astray by that deep fried curry fish ball or pint of ale?

So Jimmy, is this all rhetoric or will I-Ning be getting some company? Will you go on a hiring binge for people that can offer tax advice, succession and inheritance planning? What's your plan to cover the spectrum of needs your client base wants? Let's keep tabs shall we?

[Edit - It seems in Jimmy's word is gold! I understand that he poached two former wealth planning colleagues from Deutsche PWM in Hong Kong in March. I have the names of the 2 ladies but have no idea who they are - I do not claim to know everybody but would guess that they are relatively new to the arena]

Monday, February 8, 2010

Thieves Are Never Rogues Among Themselves

In our marvelous world, you can cheat on your taxes, you can secretly stash the money away in some financial institution abroad, someone working there will steal your personal and account data, some government/tax authority will buy the stolen goods since righteousness (and revenue) trumps law, they will prosecute you and parade you in front of the media like a prized prisoner-of-war, what can you do?

Sue! If you're a tax cheat and your data is on the market like the HSBC Swiss Private Bank data that is being auctioned off, start building your lawsuit. Did they tell you about the stolen data? Did they tell you about the tax amnesty in your home country? etc......

http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/2010/02/08/business/AP-EU-Liechtenstein-Tax-Evasion.html

One German tax evader has successfully sued a LGT Bank subsidiary, their fiduciary/trust business, for failing to inform him that his data was stolen preventing him the chance to have declared himself to German authorities and avoided more severe fine for tax fraud.

Where's the honour among thieves I ask?

Friday, February 5, 2010

Back to the Drawing Board

A few years ago, a senior executive at a European bank with vested but not direct interest, asked me about possible candidates for a greenfield set up in Singapore. I threw out 2 names that I thought were competent and possibly good fits. A greenfield requires special talent and skills and market contacts. Trailblazers are a special breed. Most in Hong Kong and Singapore are followers. The educational system and pecking order in most organisations have trained them to react or follow.

Apparently they contacted one, ignored the other, but closed the deal with an in-house transfer from Europe. This person goes out and hires a marginal assistant to help with local languages. Together they set up shop. Several years of seeing red on the bottom line, they are re-organising. The first thing building and driving a greenfield business requires is: bridges, very strong bridges. People on an island usually die.

Speculation on my part but the lack of success (which may or may not be pure failure) of the incumbent lies in failing to build the right number of bridges, building them on the right spot, or building too flimsy of a bridge or letting a bridge burn down.

The number of bridges you need depend on the organisation. A bank trust company needs a bridge to the private bankers. Independent trustees need many bridges to business feeders like lawyers and accountants. Too few bridges and business will only trickle in.

The right spot for the bridge are those that the lead you to supporters, someone who will send business your way, be it in-house or external. Some of those bridges may be half way around the world. Some just down the hall. You could have a 100 bridges but if none lead you to a supporter, then those bridges are useless.

The bridge must be strong to withstand the forces of nature, which are greed, self-interest, self-preservation and self-promotion. Money, politics, fame and recognition factors stand to topple otherwise perfectly located bridges. Put too high of a toll on the bridge and people travel by other routes. Do not have express lanes and those impatient will travel other routes. Do you have incentives (referral fees, scorecard points, mirror accounts, retro-cessions, etc) for people to use your bridge? There is a old movie called Field of Dreams with Kevin Costner where the guy is told "If you build it, he will come". Well, you can build bridges but without a reason why, people will not come. Asians can be some of the most self-centered, self-serving people, I-not-we people in business. There are plenty of bankers that undermine their in-house trust (or other businesses) if it better serves them. Loyalty is often bought, not earned and definitely not given.

Certain bridges will be burnt down. This is usually Part II of building the business. If it wasn't abundantly clear, getting people on your island is the first goal, hence the need for bridges. Now that you've got them, how you deal with them determines whether they will ever come back. Screw up in front of a lawyer and his client and the bridge to that law firm may close permanently. Dispute fees with the Team Head for Indonesia and that bridge will close down. Allow too many on the bridge and the bridge collapses. Knowing which bridges are mission critical and which ones aren't is paramount. Allow too many burning bridges and you get cut off from the world.....again.

So to the lucky guy or gal stepping in: go back to the drawing board and start sketching and mapping out your bridges, inspect the ones you have, tear down or repair the ones you need, ask for resources to build the ones you don't have.

If all this was too abstract....just think SimCity.

Tuesday, February 2, 2010

What We Really Do At Work........

SWF or NSWF that is the question. Whether 'tis nobler in the mind to fantasize about Victoria's Secret models or just scroll through her pictures on my computer......

Obviously Macquarie Bank in Sydney Australia has some IT policy issues to deal with now that this is making the news. http://www.smh.com.au/national/interest-in-assets-macquarie-worker-caught-ogling-pictures-of-miranda-kerr-live-on-tv-20100203-nbsi.html

Some "boob" is likely to lose his job over this one and make life that much more miserable for the rest of us who like to keep abreast of Page 3 girls at the start of each day.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v1m8a4Jl4ZI Look over the interviewee's right shoulder about 1 minute in.

If It Looks Like a Duck, Walks Like a Duck, Quacks like a Duck.......

It used to be that is was a duck. Nowadays, don't be so certain.

There was a time when a people in the trust industry were Trustees, Trust Officers/Managers, Trust Advisers, Fiduciary Services, etc.. Lawyers were Trust or Estates Counsel. Accountants were Tax & Trust, etc.......basically the words: "trust" or "fiduciary" appeared in the title somewhere.

Nowadays, the buzz word is: "Wealth". People in the trust business are now Wealth Planners, Wealth Relationship Managers, Wealth Management or anything that doesn't truly describe what they do. Has the word "trust" evolved into a negative? I guess so and many organisations avoid using it in describing roles or personnel in fear it invokes a negative reaction like "used car" or "insurance" salesman. The PC answer is of course, trust is just a part of our holistic wealth creation and protection strategies and we offer more than just trusts.

For job hunters, it means a lot more keywords to type in the search field and time interpreting what the hell the role is.

For recruiters it means a lot more remotely and marginally qualified applicants flooding your inbox. If you cast a wide enough net then you'll drag in flotsam and jetsam as well as your prized big fish. Then again, use the wrong bait and you end up with nothing.

Should you find a duck out of the flock of birds, you still need to discern which pond that duck came from. Read my blogs on the trust providers (lawyers, accountants & CoSecs, Bank and Independent trustees - yes, I'm still working on the 4th and 5th installments) to gain insight on what these people and organisations actually do.

God help you distinguish between one firms' O, SO, AH, DH, H, EH, AVP, VP, SVP, EVP, AD, D, SD, ED, MD or even EMD from another's AM, M or SM. I've seen people with 3-years experience get Senior Manager titles. I seen people with 6-years get Executive Director titles. I've seen people with 18-years experience carry a Senior Vice President title. These initials have as much meaning as their high school alegbra results. I'd ignore them if I were you, can't tell much about a book from its cover.

Candidates have the natural incentive to exaggerate (or even fib) about responsibilities, tasks, or duties. It's the job of the hiring manager to put those into context and relevance.

For instance, do you know which trust providers in Hong Kong or Singapore actually have their own onshore trust administration departments? Do you know which ones send everything to their Cayman or Jersey trust operations? Do you which ones subcontract out? Was your candidate really performing trust administration or was he/she merely a carrier pigeon sending files back and forth? Can a Wealth Planner ever become Head of Trust or manage a P+L if all they did was marketing? Can a Trust Administrator handle marketing and business development if there was a Wealth Planning group in that company that took all the leads in the pipeline? Where were the leads coming from? A gift horse from the private bank or laborious mining of the intermediaries? Does this lawyer really have years of PQE in private clients/trusts work or did he/she just happen to work on a few trust cases over the years? Will your candidate understand bespoked, customised solutions when his previous employer only had a 3 trust packages to market?

Fail to ask the right questions or get the answers wrong and you end up having roasted peking chicken or duck cacciatore. Usually costly, not necessarily fatal still not what you ordered. Could leave a bad taste in your mouth too. There are cases where it all works out, but more often then not, you're recruiting in a few months time, again.

Not all ducks are created equal. Not all duck ponds are the same.

Best of luck in this year's duck hunting season.

A Wolf in Sheep's Clothing

What can you say about this bank and its trust services?

Might as well hire a portfolio manager instead. Oh wait....you need to know credit processes too! That means you need to know how to leverage [technical jargon for saying we need to loan you money and make another 2% in financing charges on] the trust fund's "investable assets" in order to have more cash to purchase the bank's other "wealth management products".

I truly love the mandate: "You expand the client base with emphasis on portfolio growth and profitability." How far off can the new generation of trust marketing with guaranteed returns be? Be the first to market investment-linked personal trusts!

Care to wager if any one in the organisation has ever read a case or statute on Trustee Investments? Care to bet that they are more intimate with CAPM, MPT and EMH than say Nestle, Westminister, Cowan or Scargill.

Unfortunately, it will take some new and successful remainder/capital beneficiary lawsuit against a trustee in order to shake up the industry, otherwise it's a mad "maximize wealth" world, at least in the banking sector. Blame the P&S guys.

Here's the ad:

Trust Manager
Company: A Prominent International Consumer Bank
Exp.: 5 year(s)
Salary: Negotiable

Job Description
In this role, you solicit, develop, generate and manage full service relationships with clients with investable assets. You expand the client base with emphasis on portfolio growth and profitability. You follow up on client contacts and refer the sale of Wealth Management products and services including personal trust services, portfolio management, private banking, as well as other services available across the Company.

You provide advice, counsel and high level customer service to clients in relation to asset protection, wealth management, succession and retirement. You will take responsibilities to review existing clients’ portfolio, implement various structures such as unit trusts, private discretionary trusts and companies to maximize clients’ wealth and minimize tax. You will support standards for managing net portfolio in a manner that ensures compliance with banking regulations, policies and procedures, and policy requirements.

Job Requirements
Bachelor Degree in Finance from a reputable university, MBA, CFP, PFP a plus
Minimum 5 years hands-on experience in the offshore trust industry with experience and success in marketing trust and other offshore services to high net worth individuals.
Considerable knowledge of private banking products and services, including credit processes, trust and estates, investments, etc
Ability to understand personal and business financial statements, complex tax returns and understanding of credit structures
Strong verbal and written communication skills combined with proven sales, marketing and presentation experience
Proven problem solving, conflict resolution, time management, follow-up and decision making skills required
Fluent Cantonese and English language skills, both written and spoken. Mandarin definite advantage

Monday, February 1, 2010

Hey Tony Chan! What say Buddha?

It's almost, nearly, possibly, finally over......

The Hong Kong courts handed down its judgment on the Nina Wang estate today, in favour of......



.......



.......


........the Chinachem Charitable Foundation. Revisit: http://trustprofessioninasia.blogspot.com/2009/07/summer-vacation-and-biggest-trust-case.html

The 326page!! summary is available on the Hong Kong Judiciary website: http://legalref.judiciary.gov.hk/doc/judg/word/vetted/other/en/2007/HCAP000008H_2007.doc

With billions at stake for Tony Chan Chun Chuen (and another's year's fee for his lawyers), I would be surprised if they will not appeal the case. Unless fung shui or Buddha tells him not to that is.

On a more professional note, his Honorable Justice MH Lam's opening remarks serve a nice reminder to all those in estate/succession/testamentary/inheritance work to impress on clients to better/properly plan to avoid similar situations where "The court often has to hear evidence about some darkest corners of a testator or testatrix’s affairs" and tie up their estate for 13years.

[Edit: Tony's been arrested (and later released on bail) for document forgery.]