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This year’s Euromoney FX survey results show up some important multi-year trends. The main lesson? Foreign exchange is more competitive than ever.

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Euromoney magazine has released the results of its 41st annual foreign exchange survey, the most comprehensive quantitative and qualitative annual study available on the FX markets.

Euromoney magazine has released the results of its 41st annual foreign exchange ranking, the most comprehensive quantitative and qualitative annual study available on the FX markets.

Protectionism is undermining an otherwise moderate global outlook as growth continues, labour markets tighten and geopolitical crises calm.

Its strong performance in Euromoney’s trade finance survey – despite its recent difficulties – has left some rivals scratching their heads. What lies behind its high placing?

For this survey, private banking is defined as banking services targeted at wealthy clients (those with investable assets of $1mln+). The most obvious respondents would be customers, but given their desire for secrecy and the issues of finding a representative sample this is problematic. We have therefore asked the private banks and wealth managers themselves to identify the firms that they consider to be their top competitors – it is therefore a peer review. Participating private banks and wealth managers were sent an online questionnaire by email, or were able to access the questionnaire directly from the homepage at www.euromoney.com. The survey results are based on the scores from peer nominations received and voter participation points. There was also a market feedback section at the end of the survey which was of editorial interest only and not scored for the rankings.

In a supposedly slow-moving industry, the amount of change in global wealth management over five decades has been remarkable.

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Mark Branson, chief executive officer of Swiss financial regulator Finma, talks to Euromoney about how tax transparency has changed the trajectory of private banking and how far regulation can go in curtailing misconduct.

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UBS Wealth Management voted best global private bank; private banks expect revenues to grow, but at slower pace.

More than 2,000 private bankers took part in the 2019 Euromoney private banking survey. See who’s up and who’s down globally, regionally and by country.

For many private banks that set up in Asia in the last decade, the cost of doing business kept them locked out of the vast expansion of wealth in the region; those that didn’t leave are settling into a more mature industry, but they are a long way from being able to relax.

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Mary Callahan Erdoes of JPMorgan speaks to Euromoney about being the port in the storm during the financial crisis and opening up the private wealth market to the whole investment industry.

Morgan Stanley’s James Gorman has transformed the US wealth management industry through consolidation and a rigorous management approach.

Tan Su Shan has led DBS’s efforts to become the leading home-grown bank for wealth management in Asia, during a decade in which the number of billionaires in the region has soared.

The last 20 years of private banking have been all about building scale, international growth and professionalization; the top wealth managers are still getting bigger and are confident they have the right model – but as they struggle to maintain quality of service under pressure on revenues, new specialists are emerging.

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Financial services group CreditEase runs an app through which its private banking clients can be connected to needy women farmers in China’s rural interior. It’s a remarkable initiative taken up by 200,000 farmers and shows what can be done with low-level credit. But how does the risk management work?

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Wealth management was built by men for men, but now that women will become the largest beneficiaries of the $30 trillion intergenerational wealth transfer, the industry needs to overhaul itself. If it doesn’t, it will be letting down more than just its female clients.

If there was ever a risk of client advisers being replaced by robots, that danger has now passed. Today both robo-advisers and large wealth managers see the importance of having humans and technology work together.