Article at a glance:

Serving Europe's affluent investors

Many financial institutions in Europe have developed special offerings or businesses targeted at affluent investors. Retail banks, brokerage firms, traditional private banks, and life insurance groups have all shown interest in this market, but affluent investors seem uninterested in the new ventures, and some of them have been curtailed. McKinsey surveyed 6,000 investors, in ten countries, to see what kind of investment help they really want. As a result, the authors were able to segment the market by simple criteria into customer groups defined by different needs.

The take-away

More than half of the survey's respondents named an employee at a financial institution as their primary financial adviser. This trend, along with a simple segmentation of customer groups, should help institutions develop and cross-sell offers that fit the needs of affluent customers, even in difficult equity markets.