UBS continues to assert its position as the Middle East’s best bank for wealth management. It won this award last year and the one before that – and the one before that. It is active in every important market, continues to expand its reach and innovates intelligently, introducing products tailored to regional clients’ specific needs.
Scale and reach matter – and UBS has both in abundance. It reckons its assets in Dubai double every two to three years. It has offices in Riyadh, Doha and Dubai, and a representative office in Manama. Around 360 professionals dispense wealth management advice to regional clients; more than 90 of them are based locally.
In early 2022, UBS set up a new Middle East hub in Qatar and hired Tarek Eido to lead the wealth management advisory office. Eido reports to Ali Janoudi, head of wealth management Middle East and Africa, and group head of Middle East and North Africa at the bank. The new team is busy hiring relationship managers to serve Qatari clients in-country.
“Our wealth management franchise in the Middle East can look back on a year of record results and sustainable, diversified growth in 2022 – momentum we have maintained moving into 2023, despite challenging circumstances,” says Janoudi. “We aspire to further grow our business in the region and remain committed to the Middle East as we have been for almost 60 years. Our regional foothold is a marker of our continued success as we now serve three, in some cases even four, generations of clients.”
The bank doesn’t break out Middle East-specific wealth management data, but pre-tax profit in Europe, Middle East and Africa jumped to $1.49 billion in the full year 2022, with net new fee-generating assets of $20.3 billion. Its cost-to-income ratio inched down to 61.9%. UBS generated wealth management revenues in the Middle East and Africa last year of $620 million.
All of the key services we have come to expect of UBS are available to high and ultra-high net-worth clients in the region. They can access Wealth Way, which helps clients understand how their finances withstand market volatility and geopolitical uncertainty, and My Way, a discretionary mandate service that helps them build a portfolio to suit their needs. UBS recently moved to make it easier for its regional clients to embrace My Way, with the inclusion of Shariah-inclusive modules.
We aspire to further grow our business in the region and remain committed to the Middle East as we have been for almost 60 years
Ali Janoudi
Sustainability is increasingly integral to the bank’s wealth-management platform. It now oversees $268 billion in global sustainable investment assets, with a target of $400 billion by 2025. Its wealth management clients have invested more than $10 billion in impact investing strategies, twice the level of the strategic commitment of $5 billion that it made at the World Economic Forum in 2017.
In the field of diversity its longstanding commitment to gender finance makes it stand out as a clear industry leader: more than a third of its regional staff, including senior management, is female. The bank’s MEA Women Network, a scheme unveiled last year, hosts quarterly events that connect female UBS executives with mentors and personal branding experts, and helps them to navigate their careers.
The bank’s Optimus Foundation, a global network connecting clients with inspiring programmes, continues to go from strength to strength. In 2022, it attracted $274 million in donations and launched relief funds to help victims of floods in Pakistan, the earthquakes in Turkey and Syria, and the war in Ukraine. Its UBS Global Visionaries programme also helps the bank to grow its environmental and social impact.
