What does it mean to be a HNW individual with wealth across multiple geographies?
BNP Paribas Wealth Management has unveiled four new digital products in its digital client experience programme. Working with more than 250 people across several start-ups and fintechs, the French bank is in the second year of its client experience programme. Saloni Sardana travelled to Luxembourg to get a first hand view of the products and rates how useful and relevant they are in this digital age.
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One minimal viable product (MVP) currently being tested that particularly stands out is MyEagleVision. The app is being deployed across Luxembourg.
The launch of MyEagleVision is prompted by the fact that HNW individuals often hold assets in multiple jurisdictions and often bank with more than one institution. It then can be problematic for the client to be fully abreast of their assets and liabilities.
MyEagleVision serves as a wealth aggregation tool, where a client can view all their accounts held in various countries.
It also aggregates non-financial assets, such as real estate, collections, jewellery and cars, to name a few.
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By GlobalDataBNP Paribas’s head of digital experience, Mariam Rassai, says: “Our clients have their assets held in various banks and countries around the world. This service [myEagleVision] will give them a global view of their assets and liabilities, wherever they are held.”
“We are building this platform in cooperation with a number of start-ups. It is being designed here in Luxembourg, and the first feedback we have received from our clients is extremely positive.”
BNP Paribas’s ambition was to create a new form of wealth management that adapts banking services to every aspect of a client’s life.
This means the wealth manager is working with almost 400 clients specialistsand private banks, and in close cooperation with fintechs to embrace new technology and improve the client experience across its three international markets: Luxembourg, Geneva and Switzerland.
Vincent Lecomte, Co-CEO of BNP Paribas Wealth Management, said: “We aim to continuously improve our client experience, which is why we have initiated agile methodology and a strong co-creation with both clients and fintechs.”
Currently in its second phase, ten of the MVPs tested last year can now be used by clients in various jurisdictions.
The other three MVPs being tested are: myMeeting, myVirtualAssistant and myFeedback.
myMeeting enables the client to fix the meeting with the private banker ahead of the day, and even specify dietary requirements. It also captures the client’s personal interests.
Say a client is interested in opera music, through the app the private banker can suggest and book for any leisure-related activities that match the client’s interests.
myVirtualAssistant
myVirtualAssistant aims to use AI to tackle basic enquiries for the client in the beginning of the client relationship. For more sophisticated enquiries, the private banker gets involved.
Most of the products are being tested in BNP Paribas’s international sites: Singapore, Luxembourg, Geneva and Hong Kong.
The new MVPs, alongside existing products, are part of a wider ‘parent’ app or digital platform called MyWealth.
MyWealth is the flagship digital app that encompasses other features launched in last year’s programme such as: Youmanist, Voice of Wealth, the Leaders Connection, enabling co-investment, and myBioPass.
Rassai says: “This [myBioPass] will allow our clients to login and validate their transactions using biometrics.”
“We are aiming to roll out MyBioPass in Italy.”
myNewsFeed is one of the products that has recently been industrialised, but was not showcased at the event.
BNP Paribas is working with British startup CityFALCON in providing myNewsFeed.
myNewsFeed
It is an online tool that provides clients personalised alerts linked to their portfolio, notifications of new investment ideas, external news stories and exclusive-in-house research. The news is closely aligned to whatever the client has marked on its “watchlist.”
Rassai expects these services to be deployed all across Europe and Asia.
“If I take what we are doing with CityFALCON, a UK start-up, with them we are building an personalised aggregated news feed for our clients. Clients will have access to our research and our views on financial news but we can expand this view to other sources of information.”
Youmanist is another app that has gone live in Italy. At present only Italian residents can use the app. It enables users to benefit from a variety of content curated by any influential author or on topics ranging from food, travel, art, architecture, finance and business.
BNP says they hope to industrialise all the new MVPs in 2018, with a third season of the client experience programme to begin this year and be tested in 2019.
While Rassai says there are currently no plans for cryptocurrencies and blockchain based products to be tested, she says: “This technology [blockchain] could have many different use cases in the banking industry, for example, on payments or the KYC process. It is already [being used in some of BNP’s departments] and we [BNP Wealth Management] are also looking at the potential benefit for our clients.”
It is clear that all products offer the bank’s HNW clients a differentiated digitised approach that aims to cater every aspect of the client’s life, from leisure to private banking. MyEagleVision is a great example of where the bank is not discouraging the use of other banking institutions, but making life easier for the client by aggregating their wealth across those institutions.
Only the client can view the consolidated snapshot of the wealth across held with different asset managers, not the private banker.
Whether clients can use certain products or not, depends on where they are resident, which can be restrictive.
The true benefits of MyWealth can be better reaped once the products go live internationally, say a French resident will be able to use Youmanist without having to be an Italian resident.
2018 is an exciting year of innovation for the bank, with promise and could very well help the private bank win new HNW clients.
While the technology may seem a little daunting and fast-paced, once explained to clients through informational sessions, it will streamline the client on-boarding process and enhance the client’s private banking experience.
