mBank: Major advances in digital portfolio management

Some studies suggest heirs will look for a new financial advisor after inheriting their parents’ wealth - What are you doing to cultivate family loyalty and prevent heirs from moving their money to different institutions?

Well, it is easy to say, but not so easy to do. I do believe that the most important thing is to try to engage the potential heirs (I mean the whole family of our customers) in banking relations. We try to educate younger people banking with us in parallel to educating parents about the succession process. It is wise to communicate openly with all family members.

How do you approach advice in terms of inheritance? How does it differ from typical financial advice?

It touches rather difficult topics in a customer’s life. We are trying to approach our customers not only through legal advice, but also through psychological advice. We have some dedicated products to fulfill these needs.

How different are Millennials compared to their elders? How different are their expectations and behavior?

I reckon that answering these questions can be the topic of a university thesis. But the most important thing is “the convenience”. Millennials are extremely convenient and they need the convenience around them – the banking app, the processes, and the products, of course. Our main objective is to provide our Millennial customers with a digital experience in all aspects of our banking and wealth management services.

How have you transformed your wealth management offer to satisfy the new generation? And how do you engage potential new customers?

I do believe in digitalization as the tool to acquire/engage customers. And we at mBank are doing the digitalization – we simplify the processes (our Digital Portfolio Management received the award by Financial Times) and we invest in technology. At mBank we see digital portfolio management as an important element of our value proposition for all generations of private banking clients. 

According to research by Accenture, the current wealth management advisory model is not working for women. Do you notice differences in terms of investment behavior by women compared to men? What are some examples? And how have you tailored your offerings to serve female clients better?

I do not know the Accenture research in detail but more and more women invest their money. Women need the same tools as men do. They are different compared to men, of course. They are rather less aggressive, they need more time to make decisions. They are more conservative, they prefer to keep money safe and for long-term goals (children’s education, pension).  But, in general, they need the advisory, they need frequent contact, access to digital portfolio management, and educational events. 

Technology is being implemented to digitize almost every area of a bank, but advisory remains complex to automate. How is your bank approaching the integration of AI into its advisory services? Will it be a mix? Will the human touch always be required when it comes to wealth management?

Sure, the digitalization is everywhere. It is a part of our life. But I believe that, as you mentioned, the human touch will be always needed. The easy products (term depo/savings/others) can be done via internet or banking app, but the real investments/ “the money” needs advisory and for the time being that advisory equals human touch. 

How do you see wealth management evolving in the next decade? (open banking, platformication, new players, new technologies…)

The world changes so fast that any prediction about what it will look like in 10 years is extremely difficult. I would even say it is impossible. Open banking is around, it is changing customers behavior. But, as I said before, I do believe in the advisory model and I think, or I would say I hope, we will need this model in the years to come.