Article on Advising the Ultra-High-Net-Worth Clients

Christopher P. Woehrle recently published an Article entitled, Capital Without Borders: An Insider’s Research into the Advisors of the World’s Wealthy, Tr. & Est. (Dec. 2016). Provided below is a summary of the Article:

In Capital Without Borders: Wealth Managers and the One Percent, Dr. Brooke Harrington, associate professor of Economic Sociology at Copenhagen Business School, applies the principles of ethnography to learn the practice of wealth management and understand the outsized role of advisors in representing their clients. Her book is very timely, as the release of the Panama Papers spotlighted the issue of offshore tax havens, while the number of U.S. citizens renouncing their tax citizenship continues to climb. The self-perpetuating nature of the wealthy avoiding the payment of income and transfer taxes exacerbates global income and wealth inequality. 

I’ll highlight the major findings from Dr. Harrington’s interviews with wealth managers, whose role she sees as the defenders of ultra-high-net-worth (UHNW) individuals and their families ($30 million minimum in investable assets) through legal and financial expertise. I’ll also examine the workhorse techniques of asset protection and the positioning of philanthropy. I’ll conclude with the policy implications of the owners of capital increasingly free of any tax home.