في تحول استراتيجي لافت، بدأت مكاتب إدارة الثروات العائلية في الشرق الأوسط بإعادة صياغة نهجها الاستثماري، متخلية تدريجياً عن التركيز التقليدي على الأسواق الغربية لصالح استثمارات محلية وإقليمية واعدة. هذا التوجه، الذي أبرزه نيلز زيلكنز، رئيس إدارة الثروات في الشرق الأوسط ببنك يو بي إس (UBS) في حديث خاص مع «إرم بزنس»، يعكس ثقة متزايدة في استقرار ونمو اقتصادات المنطقة، إلى جانب رغبة في استغلال الفرص الناشئة في قطاعات مثل الذكاء الاصطناعي، الطاقة المتجددة، والعقارات.
يؤكد زيلكنز، أن «التفضيلات تختلف بشكل واضح إقليمياً، كما أنها تتغير بمرور الوقت»، مشيراً إلى أن النقاش اليوم يدور بشكل أكبر حول «الاستثمارات داخل المنطقة». ويدعم «التقرير العالمي للمكاتب العائلية 2025» هذا التحول بالأرقام؛ حيث تخصص المكاتب العائلية في الشرق الأوسط 8% من محافظها لأسهم الأسواق الناشئة، وهو ضعف المتوسط العالمي البالغ 4%.
00:10الطعام الجديد ب holiness أنزع مختلفة في عالمهم
00:14مختلفة فيه، وهي يحبط مع مختلفة.
00:18لاتوجود في العالم لسيارات وجود مختلفة
00:25ومن قديمة الآن.
00:27For example, 20 years ago, we were definitely more discussing about diversification outside of the region for different reasons.
00:37And nowadays, there is more discussion around investments within the region.
00:41So what we've seen from the report is that there is a higher attribution to investments towards emerging markets from this region,
00:50which is the family offices in the region have maybe a higher affinity towards emerging markets, including India.
00:57where we have clearly a higher allocation and also China.
01:01Family offices here are connected to operating businesses.
01:05So it's important for them to understand that there needs to be a diversification between the businesses that they have regionally and also the investment regionally.
01:14And also when it comes to the structuring of their wealth in general.
01:18So what we often see in this region, I think this is also something that came out of the report,
01:23is that inheritance planning or succession planning is somewhat something that is not on everybody's mind.
01:37Regional preferences, but there's also preferences in terms of real estate, in terms of asset classes.
01:42And I mean, you have been in this region, I have been in this region for a very long time.
01:47So real estate plays a very important role when it comes to investments.
01:50And that obviously drives the allocation to alternative investments for these clients and the family offices that we see here,
01:59because real estate forms part of the alternative space.
02:03So we talked about preferences right before, and the preferences are not only regionally different,
02:10but they're also different when it comes to asset classes.
02:13And in the Middle East, what is interesting for the ones that have been going to the Middle East is that real estate is on everybody's mind.
02:20So the real estate exposure and the affinity to real estate is the second highest globally,
02:27according to the report, to real estate in the Middle East.
02:31So that obviously drives the high exposure to direct private equity investments.
02:40And at the same time, in the Middle East, what you're seeing is the lowest exposure to public equity.
02:46And the question here, why is this?
02:48And I think one of the reasons why this is, is that in the Middle East,
02:53you have a concept of long-term partnership, of strong involvement, right,
02:59into investments, but also the level of sophistication that we have seen going up in recent years
03:07when it comes to talents that are working at family offices here in this region.
03:12And that's why we believe that the exposure to direct investments in this particular region is very high.
03:20We need to challenge them, obviously, from a UBS perspective.
03:23And we need to make sure that their asset allocation globally and holistically is still the right one,
03:29because obviously these are relatively higher risk investments,
03:33especially when you're risking, when you're investing in this region into private equity.
03:37So we would recommend to maybe go into infrastructure investments, for example,
03:42or then reallocate some of the larger real estate investments that they have here in the region
03:47into alternative investments such as hedge funds and private equity.
03:52Yeah, for example, you know, when a business or a family is heavily involved in the business here,
04:00let's say in real estate, right, and then they have additionally also a lot of real estate investments here in this region,
04:08then, of course, we will make them aware that their allocation of their overall wealth is very much tuned towards this region number one
04:17and also specifically towards this asset class.
04:19So we would then challenge them and say that I think it makes sense for you to have a more, you know,
04:26diversified investment and maybe go into more liquid assets, for example, in public equities.
04:31Or, you know, if you want to regionally diversify, we would then recommend them to go into different regions for investment purposes.
04:42So we're just trying to look at it from a holistic perspective,
04:46not that these clients are too much exposed to one region or to one business in particular.
04:52I mean, it's hard to say what exact amount family offices really allocate to AI.
05:06But what we're seeing in this region is that AI, healthcare, data centers are clearly a focal point, right, of a lot of family offices here.
05:18And by the way, there are also our long-term investment themes, you know, from a UPS perspective.
05:25And that, you know, somehow it's not surprising because the governments here in this region,
05:31they are really having a strategic vision, right, to foster these kind of industries quite significantly.
05:38I mean, when you look at, for example, Abu Dhabi, we have G42, with Stargate, which is a huge AI project.
05:49But also in Saudi, we have Humane, which is fostered by PIF, which is also a very large project in this particular area.
05:58And then, you know, in the healthcare space, we also have in Saudi, the healthcare transformation program that is undergoing.
06:05And these governments, they want to open this up for public investments as well.
06:11So naturally, family offices are exposed to investment opportunities in this specific regard, right?
06:18And I think that is definitely something that is interesting.
06:22It also is a testament of the foresight of some of these governments here in the region.
06:28Some of our clients, you know, we bank every second billionaire in the world.
06:34And what our clients would like to see is connectivity with these kind of investors,
06:40but also clients who have exposure to AI, who have exposure to these healthcare industries
06:47where they potentially can do connectivity and we can help them with them.
06:52I mean, for example, in Saudi, we had an event lately where we invested, where we invited some European investors.
07:00They came to Saudi, we gave them exposure to some of our Saudi investors.
07:04And the same just happened last week.
07:06I just came back from Hong Kong last week where we had a delegation of Middle East investors
07:12and we took them to Hong Kong at our Asian investors conference where we gave them exposure to some of our clients over there.
07:19So that connectivity is a big advantage for UBS and for our clients.
07:25Main advice would be for the family offices to early engage with the next generation.
07:33Yes.
07:34To make sure that the next generation is into the structure of the family.
07:42Know that there is quite an interest from family members to become part of the family office setup versus their operating businesses.
07:51And I think here we advise to start early on, also to make sure that the succession planning and the structuring of the wealth is properly organized
08:01so that we have a very stable and solid footing for the next generation to take over.
