What’s the value of a wealth planner? For Ana Queipo, it’s in their ability to see interconnections. “I always say that your wealth is a jigsaw puzzle. You have many different pieces and not all of them seem to slot together. But then you start looking carefully at each piece, putting it in the right place, and creating a bigger picture that serves you throughout your life.”
Ana, who has worked in wealth planning for 26 years, believes people develop a greater sense of the interconnectedness of wealth management as they age. “Wealth planning basically starts when young people start earning a salary or setting up their own business and ask themselves what to do next. At first, they tend to have a narrower view and just think, ‘I’m going to invest in this, how much interest will it pay? Or: ‘What taxes will I have to pay on it?’ Then, as time goes by, they realise how their needs change and interact with one another.”
For Ana, it’s in their ability to see the bigger picture – to know how certain investments or assets could improve a client’s overall situation – that wealth planners can add the most value. She draws a comparison to visiting the hairdresser. “When I go to have my hair cut, I often don’t know what style to choose. I’m often worried that I’ll come out looking like a poodle! But the hairdresser is a professional: she considers the shape of my face, the texture of my hair, the latest trends. I’m happy to let her do her thing in the knowledge that the choices she suggests will be the best ones for me.”
Entrepreneurial vigour boosts Spain’s wealth market
Spain is one of the top-20 countries in the world in terms of ultra-high-net-worth individuals, according to the 2023 Credit Suisse/UBS Global Wealth Report – with its HNWI population expected to grow by 40 per cent by 2027. Julius Baer arrived in Madrid 12 years ago, when it took over the local wealth management business of Merrill Lynch. Already the leading Swiss wealth manager in Spain, it has since added a further office in Barcelona and plans to further expand on the Iberian Peninsula in the years ahead.
“We have a wide range of clients from different generations and with different needs,” says Ana. “We serve entrepreneurs, family businesses, and highly qualified professionals seeking to grow and preserve their wealth. We also serve clients who’ve already left the business world, selling their companies to enjoy that wonderful moment of living off what they have generated and sharing it with their family.”
Ana has also noticed that the younger generation of clients in her home country are much more dynamic than they used to be. “There’s a segment of entrepreneurs in Spain who’re constantly starting something new. They establish their first business in their 20s, grow it successfully, and then sell it and move on to their next business idea.”
It’s a fast-paced cycle, but the risk is that they’re so focused on the business that they have no time to plan their own financial futures. “I’ve had several interactions recently with young clients who’ve generated significant wealth from their start-ups,” she says. “When they want to sell the business, they realise they don’t have the optimal structure in place to sell or don’t know what to do after the sale or how to structure that wealth to manage succession issues.”
For Ana, this is when the ‘advisory’ element of wealth planning really comes to the fore in establishing successful long-term client relationships. “We need to be there to help them right from the beginning, and tell them, ‘Yes, I know your business is fantastic, and yes, I know you travel all day, but I need a couple of hours of your time to discuss how we can optimise the management of your wealth!’”
Forming a precise picture of the client’s needs
What approach does Ana take to ensuring that Julius Baer’s wealth management solutions are tailored to clients’ needs? “The first thing I do is to sit down with the client, get to know them, their personal situation, and what they want to achieve. I may already have an idea of what I need to provide, but I adapt that to fit their objectives. I ask them all sorts of questions: Will they keep investing continuously? Will they distribute their wealth? Do they need a salary? How will they live? Do they have children? Where do the children live?”
In addition to putting the pieces of the client’s personal jigsaw together, she also considers their professional profile, although she says the actual industry in which the client is active is of secondary importance. “I don’t have to have an in-depth knowledge of their business activity. If they’re developing microchips or semiconductors, I’m unlikely to understand much about that. On the other hand, if their business involves risk, it’s important that we take that into account – perhaps to manage the risks restructuring the wealth and diversifying.”
Another aspect of wealth planning that has changed considerably during Ana’s career is the increasingly cross-border nature of wealth planning. “Nowadays, people can move countries almost as easily as they change hats,” she says. “They take a job in one country, buy a house in another. Their children study or live abroad, their business expands overseas. They retire somewhere warmer. The complexity that brings can be difficult to navigate specially when talking about succession.”
Ana says that, although she is responsible for Julius Baer’s wealth planning activities in Spain, she is part of the Bank’s international wealth planning team who are specialists in different functions and jurisdictions. “If a client in Spain wants to expand her business to Italy, we have experts in those countries who can help her define the best structure for developing her business. Or if another client wants to buy a property in France, we have specialists who know what consequences you need to know and consider.” The same applies to clients investing in Spain: “Anybody who wants to buy a house here needs to have a Foreigner Identity Number (NIE) – that’s something that may be frustrating for a client, but without which they cannot purchase a property, even if they have the money.”
Moving to Madrid brings capital gains for Ana
Although she too has also lived abroad for periods of time, Ana says that for now, Spain, and particularly its pulsating capital city, is home. “I love travelling abroad and I love foreign countries, but for me living in Madrid is wonderful.” Despite being born in Malaga, she has always had a strong connection to Madrid. Her mother grew up on one of the city’s central thoroughfares, Calle Almagro, and Ana says she was immediately won over when she moved there 25 years ago to start her career. “It was love at first sight. Madrid is a wonderfully vibrant city. It has beautiful light, a great climate, and you can do whatever you want. It’s big enough to get lost in, but small enough to live life on your own terms.”
A similar sense of independence keeps her motivated in her professional life, too. “I’ve been with Julius Baer for 12 years now, and I must say I’m really happy. I love my work. I appreciate the freedom of being able to tell a client how we can help them without having to sell them anything. Thanks to Julius Baer’s open-product platform, we have everything we need at our fingertips – we can develop our ideas – but we don’t have to push any product or service. We just need to help clients to have a plan or wealth structure that best suits their needs.” Or, to put it in Ana’s own words: to make sure all the pieces of the puzzle fit.