Strategy & Practice Management
Jade By HSBC Premier Casts Wide Net
Murli Adury of Citi
Dec 13, 2017
In an exclusive interview, Murli Adury explains how his Jade by HSBC Premier segment is looking to open HSBC offerings to the HNW client base with an innovative suite of services.
Handling “one of the largest affluent segment client bases anywhere in the world for any bank”, holds no fears for Murli Adury, the new man at the helm of Jade by HSBC Premier segment.
Murli has set his stall out to give Jade members something different and is relishing the challenge of trying to win over the hearts and minds of an invitation-only membership program where a seat at the table costs anything from $1m - $5m.
“My responsibility is to develop propositions and revamp the client journeys and the client experience; to deliver the best value for our customers,” Murli said. “So that means looking at the different products and the offers that we make to the customer, while at the same time making sure that the bank is growing profitably with this customer base.”
Murli moved to HSBC and Hong Kong this year from Citibank in Singapore, where he was regional head for Citigold Private Client, a segment exclusively for HNW clients. He was responsible for client acquisition, business growth, development of new products and services.
The new Jade service is available to HSBC Premier customers who have a minimum of $1m - $5m in investable assets, and is said to offer banking services unlike any others given to HSBC clients, with a Jade member being offered a personal Premier Client Manager and a team of wealth management experts, 24 hours a day, seven days a week in addition to other offers and incentives.
Lifestyle elements
Murli added: “We provide a bunch of services that are different. Apart from a variety of wealth products, we also look after the customer by identifying their needs and addressing their various wealth planning goals in a more personal fashion. We then provide various solutions to help meet those financial goals. We also have lifestyle elements on offer whereby a concierge service is provided, with partners including Etihad Airways, Mandarin Oriental, Small Luxury Hotels of the World and luxury online fashion shop, Mytheresa.com.”
The move from major bank to major bank and from Singapore to Hong Kong was an easy decision to make, Murli said. “There were a couple of things that made the decision quite easy in the end. What was really interesting from a career standpoint was that I felt HSBC in Hong Kong has a very unique market leadership position. It is one of the biggest wealth businesses anywhere in the world, and HSBC Premier enjoys a high market share.
“There is a substantial amount of new work coming along with the new Jade segment, which needs a lot of build up. This goes back to my past experience as well, so it is an opportunity to do that but at a much larger scale. It’s an opportunity to work at a country level as opposed to a regional role, which can be more oriented around design and concepts and strategy. A country role gets us in front of the customer lot more than a regional role would. So, from a personal perspective, I wanted something that would get me a lot more execution and on the ground.”
Expansion plans
Murli is also looking to expand the appeal of both Premier Banking and Jade with other HSBC offerings and bring them into the spotlight of a wider audience. “I think we are planning for a number of new wealth solutions that are world class and we have to absolutely bring them to the table. This is a segment base that really looks for these kinds of solutions. HSBC, as a global bank, definitely has the capability to bring these solutions to them.
“We are also looking to revamp the Premier segment. We want to build out products and solutions that will engage Asian families and in particular Chinese families a lot more. This could be for a typical Chinese family interested in education for their children, or if their parents are at retirement age we can talk about their needs in that respect. We can talk to these types of clients about various protection products and we can talk about creating school debenture loans, or special education offers on all of those aspects,” Murli said.
“We can offer tie-ups and partnerships from various universities and from education consultants, so we are hoping to bring a number of different offers and capabilities to this segment, in addition to the ability to easily and flexibly engage with the bank on their transactional needs. We hope to leverage HSBC’s Global network to bring insights on wealth, property and make them digitally accessible at a local level.
“These are some of my priorities and I think an additional priority will be addressing the needs of the international clients including expats as well as the non-resident Chinese community. Hong Kong is both an origin and destination for the international community and HSBC as a Global bank is uniquely positioned to help such customers.”
After hours with Murli Adury
Murli Adury was born in India and moved to the US in the mid-90s, working for nine years as a consultant. He completed a MBA at The University of Chicago, Booth School of Business and joined Citibank in 2007. He moved to Singapore in 2009 with Citi to launch and manage the Citigold Private Client segment.
Married with two children aged 13 and 8, Murli moved to Hong Kong to join HSBC in 2017. He lives with his family in Tung Chung.
Head of Citigolld Private Client, APAC & EMEA at Citi