Bank or independent wealth manager? In my experience, the strongest Swiss setups use both. The two Swiss Army knives in the basket by my door carry different logos. Over dinner in Crans last month, a friend picked them both up and asked which one I would actually use.
One carries a bank’s name. The other carries ours. He expected me to defend my own, and I understood why — in Switzerland, the discussion is still often framed as a choice: bank or independent wealth manager. I told him I would keep both, because nobody designed them to replace each other.
That answer sounds diplomatic. In practice it is anything but comfortable.
Two roles that were never meant to compete
The custodian bank brings the balance sheet, execution, credit facilities and infrastructure. An independent wealth manager brings continuity of advice, coordination across several banking relationships, and a view of the whole family situation rather than a single account. The roles overlap at the edges, and the client is usually the one who discovers where. Not because anyone breaches an agreement — but because the agreements rarely say who picks up the phone first when markets move over a weekend.
How to close the gap between bank and independent wealth manager
Three things prevent that:
- Define in writing who owns the advice and who owns the execution, including who makes the first call.
- Agree how information flows when assets sit with more than one institution, so nobody reconstructs the picture at the worst possible moment.
- Test what happens when people change roles, because a structure should outlive the individuals in it.
For Relationship Managers and Private Bankers, the useful question is not who leads the relationship. It is who the client believes is responsible when something moves quickly.
Where have you seen that gap open — and what closed it?
Source: https://vapa.ch/bank-or-independent-wealth-manager/ · vapa.ch
