Article by Fergus Horsfall published in Citywire Switzerland

‘The industry is not ready’: MFO sharpens strategy for female clients

NewOak, founded by siblings Amelie and Gregory Armstrong, is bringing together a network of experts to support female clients.

Supervising the handover of assets to younger generations is one of the most important tasks for a wealth manager. NewOak, a multi-family office in Geneva, is seeing a significant number of women taking charge of family assets and has upgrad edits wealth offering accordingly.

‘They are part of the investment decisions nowadays. Yet the industry is not really ready,’ CEO Gregory Armstrong told Citywire.

Sometimes, women can feel uncomfortable talking about these topics, because they were previously dealt with by their brothers, fathers or husbands.

NewOak’s upgraded wealth offering for women starts with education and helping female clients feel empowered about their finances, says business development executive Sabrina Fares.

‘You really need to have a sensitivity around psychology and some elements of coaching, helping them challenge advisers,’ Fares said.

‘We’re putting together a network of experts, whether it is lawyers or notaries, that are either women or very genuinely sensitive to the question of financial empowerment for women.’

More broadly, NewOak likes to work with a range of external providers such as trust companies, but also remains independent and allows its clients to change providers of different services as they prefer.

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A fresh face

NewOak was co-founded in 2020 by Gregory Armstrong and his sister Amelie, who is chief operating officer, when they were around 30 years old.

Accordingly, the company sees itself as a family acting for families.

‘It was important for us to have a balance between men and women, because we also approach things differently,’ Amelie Armstrong told Citywire.

‘We also find it very important to have different generations within the company,’ she said. The firm’s staff span four generations, ranging from 25 to 75.

There are a few ways in which the firm wants to stand out from competitors.

One is having no retrocessions. Another is the technology side.

‘We’re really trying to implement AI across all functions within the company, so it’s not just an add-on,’ Fares said. She gave relationship management, legal, operations and asset management as examples and believes that NewOak’s youth makes it easier to embed newer technologies.

As well as a range of listed asset classes, NewOak’s investment management team invests client assets in private equity and private debt deals.

NewOak’s team also participates in the deals and does not charge entry fees.

The firm is also willing to use derivatives to customise client portfolios, and does not offer any in-house funds.

Earlier this year, it launched a dedicated offering for management of occupational pension assets, developed in partnership with specialist firm Swiss PensionAdvisors.

NewOak doesn’t want to stand still. Its market coverage so far has been largely EMEA, but it feels ready to broaden its horizons.

While the firm did not share specific numbers, Gregory Armstrong said it has grown well organically.

Nevertheless, he added: ‘It’s always interesting to look at if there are other players on the market with whom we could join forces or that could be good synergies.’

The company currently has offices in Geneva and Zurich. 

‘As we’re fairly young, we have a lot of ideas, and I would say that the probability is that we will open additional offices,’ he said.

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