Profit at Pictet dropped nearly ten percent last year, hit by the Genevan wealth boutique's recruiting spree of 374 new staff.
The Swiss private bank's profit last year dropped 9.5 percent to 539 million Swiss francs last year, the bank said in an emailed statement on Wednesday. Pictet said the fall is largely due to investing in infrastructure – as well as adding 374 new employees last year.
Pictet poached dozens of private bankers last year under wealth management co-head Boris Collardi. Shortly after joining the Genevan rival mid-2018, the star banker broke with a centuries-old tradition of diffidence among Geneva's private banks. His biggest coup was poaching an 18-strong Middle East team from Julius Baer.
Healthy Fresh Money
The bank won 25 billion francs in fresh money from clients in fund management, private banking, and asset services. Pictet, which is controlled by seven partners including descendants of the founding family, doesn't specify how much money purely from wealthy clients it took in.
The bank's revenue edged more than 2 percent lower to 2.7 billion francs. Crosstown rival Lombard Odier is expected to report the year later this month. Pictet's assets, as well as those it oversees in custody, climbed 16 percent to 576 billion francs at year-end. This is the result of favorable market swings as well as the client inflows.
Eco Balance Sheet
The 215-year-old bank is purging itself of exposure to fossil fuel producers as well as energy sources oil and gas and thermal coal. In practice, this means Pictet will strip 250 million from its balance sheet, to zero, by year-end.
«Irrespective of collective public sector action on moving to a carbon-neutral economy, companies in the private sector should also advance this objective independently,» senior partner Renaud de Planta said. «As we have full control of our balance sheet, this is one undertaking that we can make now.»
