By Chew Hui Min

iFast Financial launched today the first independent wealth management platform in Singapore catering to high net worth individuals.

The iFast Global Prestige (iGP) platform, which goes live on Nov 20, will cater to independent financial advisers, private banks and other institutions servicing clients with assets of more than S$2 million.

Mr Lim Chung Chun, chairman and CEO of iFAST Corporation Pte Ltd said, "High net worth individuals in Singapore had mainly one option when it came to managing their wealth, namely private banks.

"iGP will offer a new proposition to both wealth advisers and HNWIs in Singapore and the region. They can tap on a wealth management platform that will focus on providing a comprehensive suite of products and services with transparent and competitive fees."

However, unlike its online retail investment platform Fundsupermart, the new service by iFast will be open only to wealth advisers and not to individual investors.

Mr Lim Chung Chun says that this is partly due to new guidelines stipulating that complex investment products can only be sold under advisement, in addition to their awareness that in catering to high net worth individuals there are "a whole set of factors" that go beyond technology.

iFast now manages about 57 per cent of the assets advised by independent financial advisers (IFAs) in Singapore, but the mass affluent segment, or those with assets of $100,000 to $300,000 remains the main client base.

Clients with more than half a million in assets - the minimum investment amount required to start an iGP account - make up less than 1 per cent of their current client base .

With this latest platform, it hopes to tap into the assets of about 61,000 high net worth individuals in Singapore, which the Asia-Pacific Wealth Report 2009 estimates to be about US$272 billion.

Its strategy now looks to be offering an enhanced range of services for a smaller group of affluent clients, and iFast aims to recruit 50 to 100 advisors in its first year - a fraction of the more than 2,000 representatives currently using its iFast Singapore platform.

So how will the new platform attract highly sought after clients already being wooed by better established players in the market?

According to iFast, part of its value proposition is in providing an independent platform of investment modelled after more developed markets such as Switzerland's.

Moving away from a transactional, commission-based system that is still prevalent in Singapore, it is introducing a wrap account where advisers earn an annual fee based on the performance of their clients' portfolios, with the aim of putting the focus back on the long-term performance of clients' portfolios.

As they put it, "wealth advisers know they can earn more fees if they take good care of their clients' portfolios, while the clients can rest assured that they will only pay more fees if their wealth advisers are providing good advice."

They are also offering a wider range of products including restricted funds, a larger selection of exchange traded funds, hedge funds and non-traditional asset classes, such as funds investing in wine, agricultural land, life settlements and more.

However, they are also wary of the "culture of excessive risk" in the finance industry, and will subject all the products to, in the words of Investment Planning manager Jack Chin, the "grandmother test". In more concrete terms, they are avoiding high risk "gambling" products, zero-sum game products and other investments which take on excessive risk for short-term gains.

As part of their service, they will also be organising events and activities for wealth advisers and their clients like wine appreciation sessions, client dinners, and will also throw in Formula One tickets in the mix. This is to give opportunities for clients to have close interaction with their wealth advisers.