Wealth Management
Family Wealth Architecture
One diagnosis, one design, one counterpart, for wealth that spans families, generations and jurisdictions.
Start with the diagnosis.A written assessment of the family, its assets and its exposure, at a fixed fee from EUR 4,900, credited in full against the design. The family keeps it whether or not it proceeds.
Family Wealth Architecture
Most families with significant wealth do not have a structure. They have an accumulation: an account opened for one transaction, a company formed for another, a trust a lawyer recommended fifteen years ago. Each made sense when it was created. Together they rarely do. Family Wealth Architecture is the mandate in which IFB looks at the whole and designs it once, deliberately.
Four stages
1. Diagnosis
We begin with the family, not the assets: who belongs to it, where its members live and hold citizenship, what they own and through which entities, which obligations already apply, and what the family wants its wealth to do in twenty years. We map exposure as well, legal, political, jurisdictional and personal. The result is a written assessment the family keeps, whether or not it proceeds. The diagnosis is a paid mandate at a fixed fee, set out below.
2. Design
On that basis we design the structure: which trusts, foundations, holding companies and accounts, in which jurisdictions, and why. The Cook Islands, Nevis, Liechtenstein, Switzerland, Singapore and the United Arab Emirates each answer a different question, and the right answer for one branch of a family may be the wrong one for another. Every element of the design states its purpose, its running cost and its reporting obligations, so that the family understands what it owns and what it must declare.
3. Implementation
IFB then carries the design into effect as the family’s concierge. Trust companies, corporate service providers, law firms and tax advisers licensed in each jurisdiction form the structures and give the advice their licences cover. IFB selects them, briefs them, coordinates their work and holds them to the timetable. Accounts are opened at IFB and, where the design requires it, at other institutions. The family deals with one counterpart, not twelve.
4. Stewardship
A structure has to be run, not merely established. The family may entrust IFB with the ongoing management of its wealth under a mandate, or build an office of its own. In that case we recruit and supervise its people: the tax adviser, the lawyer, a chief financial officer, and the specialists who protect the family itself, from personal security to the security of its data.
Declared, documented, defensible
Asset protection is legitimate when it is built in advance, disclosed wherever disclosure is required, and documented well enough to withstand a court, a tax authority or a disappointed heir. Every structure we design is reportable under FATCA and the Common Reporting Standard where they apply. Structures that depend on concealment fail precisely when they are needed. Ours are designed for that moment.
Who delivers the mandate
The mandate is led by International Finance Bank, with Beaufort for asset management and securitisation, and licensed partner firms in each jurisdiction for formation, trusteeship, legal and tax advice. IFB remains the family’s single point of contact throughout; partner firms act under their own licences and engagement terms.
How a mandate runs
The first conversation
Forty-five minutes by video with a senior banker of the Bank. We listen, ask the questions that matter and tell you whether a mandate makes sense for your family. Confidentiality applies from the first word, under the Bank’s Client Confidentiality Policy.
Engagement
If both sides wish to proceed, an engagement letter sets out the scope and the fee of the diagnosis. Every later stage is agreed in writing before it begins, so the family always knows what it is committing to, and why.
The diagnosis in practice
We work from documents, not impressions: existing deeds, statutes and statements, residence and citizenship, the reporting already filed. Where the family wishes, we speak with its members individually, because the heir who will one day carry the structure rarely sees it the way its founder does. The result is a written assessment of what the family owns, how it is held, where it is exposed and what it wants to achieve.
The design memorandum
The design is delivered as a memorandum the family can test against any other adviser: the options considered and why the others were rejected, the recommended structure and its jurisdictions, its running cost, its reporting calendar, and the partner firm proposed for each element.
Implementation in practice
Each partner firm is engaged under its own engagement letter, so the family or its structure holds a direct contractual relationship with every provider. IFB prepares the files, briefs each firm, keeps the timetable, coordinates signatures and opens the accounts. Nothing is signed that the family has not seen explained.
The annual review
Laws change, children move abroad, a business is sold. Once a year we review the whole structure against the family’s situation and the law as it then stands, and we keep the reporting calendar so that no filing is missed in any jurisdiction.
Why one counterpart, and not twelve independent firms
A family can, of course, commission each step separately: a trust company here, a law firm there, a tax adviser in each country of residence. Many do. The difficulty is not that these firms are poor. It is that each of them sees only its own part.
Structures fail at the joints
A trust, a holding company and a family member’s move to another country are rarely reviewed together by the people who set them up separately. Each adviser optimises its own element; the tax adviser in one country does not see the foundation in another. Errors arise where the pieces meet: controlled-foreign-company rules, beneficial-ownership registers, a reporting duty each firm assumed another had covered. We design the joints, because we see the whole.
Bankable from the start
Many structures are built correctly and then cannot open an account, because a bank’s compliance department cannot follow them. A structure designed by a bank is designed to be bankable: the documentation that our own compliance requires, and that correspondent banks expect, is part of the design rather than an afterthought.
One file, one memory
Instead of retelling the family’s story to a dozen firms, the family tells it once. When the founder can no longer act, the heirs do not inherit a drawer of engagement letters; they inherit one counterpart who knows how the whole was built and why.
Confidentiality by design
Each partner firm receives what its task requires, and no more. The complete picture stays with the Bank, under a confidentiality standard the Bank has adopted as binding on itself.
Independent in selection
IFB owns none of the trust companies, law firms or tax advisers it works with, and takes no commission from them. Each partner is chosen for the family’s case on its merits alone, and is replaced if it no longer serves the family. Our only fee is the one the family agrees with us.
When you do not need us
If a family needs one simple step, a will, a single company or one account, it does not need an architect, and we will say so in the first conversation. The mandate is for families whose wealth already spans several countries, entities or generations, or soon will.
What it costs
A family should know what it is committing to before it commits. The first conversation costs nothing. The diagnosis has a fixed fee. Every later stage is agreed in writing before it begins, and if the family proceeds to the design, the diagnosis fee is credited in full.
Family Wealth Architecture fees
| Stage | Scope | Fee (EUR) |
|---|---|---|
| First conversation | 45 minutes by video with a senior banker | No charge |
| Diagnosis: individual or couple | Written assessment of assets, structures, residences, exposure and objectives | from €4,900 |
| Diagnosis: several generations or family branches | As above, including separate conversations with family members where wished | from €9,500 |
| Design | Design memorandum: structure, jurisdictions, running costs, reporting calendar, partner firms | from €14,500 (individual or couple), from €24,500 (several generations); diagnosis fee credited in full |
| Implementation | Coordination by IFB; partner firms bill the family or its structure directly, at their own rates and without mark-up | €3,500 per element; partner fees at cost |
| Stewardship | Annual review, reporting calendar and coordination of all partner firms; investment management under a separate mandate | from €9,500 a year (from €18,000 for several generations); investment management see Wealth Management Fees |
A diagnosis typically requires 25 to 35 hours of work: about four fifths at advisory level and one fifth in review by a senior banker. At the Bank’s published consulting rates this would amount to roughly €10,750 to €15,050. As a fixed fee it starts at €4,900, and it is credited in full if the family proceeds to the design.
The full schedule, with three costed mandates and the market prices of the components, is set out under Wealth Architecture Fees.
Request a diagnosis
Tell us about your family’s situation
A few details let us prepare the first conversation properly. Everything you send goes directly to the bank and is treated in confidence.
Prefer to talk first? Book a 45-minute videoconference.