Dead Sea, Jordan: Merrill Lynch's Middle Eastern wealth management division is set to outperform the regional market's growth rate of around ten per cent in part due to opportunities in Saudi Arabia, a senior executive said yesterday.
Merrill's private bank, a subsidiary now of Bank of America, is one of the international banks with the longest presence in the Middle East, with offices in Bahrain, Dubai and Riyadh.
Boosted by its enormous natural resources, the Middle East in recent years has attracted most international private banks who vie with local competitors for a share of the region's wealth. Between 2009 and 2010, the region's private banking market grew at around ten per cent, according to recent reports.
Wealthy families
"This type of growth will continue this year and also next year," Tamer Rashad, managing director and head of the bank's Middle Eastern private banking arm told Zawya Dow Jones on the sidelines of the World Economic Forum at the Dead Sea in Jordan.
He added the bank is set to outperform those growth forecasts, pointing to opportunities such as wealthy families in the region, as well as a country like Saudi Arabia, which accounts for slightly over half of the Middle Eastern market for wealthy individuals.
Merrill intends to capture some of that growth by further hiring relationship managers and possibly introducing new products, such as Islamic finance offerings.
