Wealth has always followed geopolitics

Michael Macfarlane opened the Wealth Office series with two reference points. At the turn of the twentieth century, by his figures, Great Britain accounted for 2.5% of the global population and held 25% of global wealth. By the turn of the twenty-first, the USA accounted for 4.2% of the population and held over 30%. His argument is that the order is changing again, and that wealth is no longer clustered into regions by geopolitics.

For centuries, the history of wealth has been closely tied to geopolitics. And for each new age, wealth manifests itself in different ways.

— Michael Macfarlane, Wealth Office

The guests who have followed describe that change from Hong Kong, Shenzhen, Singapore, London and the Gulf. Their accounts do not always agree, and the disagreements are as instructive as the common ground.

The engine behind Asia's rise

Keyu Jin, economist and author of The New China Playbook, argues that much of the Western world misreads China in three ways. It misreads the economic model, the relationship between people and authority, and the country as a whole when it looks through a single cultural, geopolitical or security lens. In her account, China combines political centralisation with economic decentralisation. Local governments carry out central direction, coordinate talent and capital and help seed industrial clusters. She calls the result an innovation flywheel, and points to a district of Shenzhen where thousands of design firms, around 4,000 drone companies and some 2,000 research and development firms operate alongside manufacturers within roughly a kilometre.

Jin is clear about the costs, including wasteful investment, overcapacity and debt. She is equally clear about what the competition produces.

And as most people who have been to China will know, there's no market more competitive than China. So today, if you make it in China, you can make it in the world.

— Keyu Jin, Wealth Office

Other guests reach related conclusions from business experience. Howard Bilton, who moved to Hong Kong in 1992, describes China's shift from low-cost manufacturing to a more innovative, higher-end economy. He sees its political continuity as an advantage for business planning, while adding that the West would not adopt that system because life is about more than business. Marco Poon attributes China's progress in AI, automation and new energy to a clear national plan and energy infrastructure built in advance. Nicolas de Santis has no doubt that Asia is ahead in thinking about the future.

Jin also argues that the fragmentation many predicted after COVID, the war in Ukraine and an energy crisis did not happen. Smaller economies and middle powers now cushion shocks through rerouted manufacturing, parallel payment systems and new sources of critical inputs. In her view, opportunity is what draws talent and wealth, and the most adaptable companies now spread their functions across regions.

Hubs that compete and co-build

Macfarlane cites estimates that more than US$100 trillion will pass between generations over the next two decades, nearly half of it in Asia. Marshall Jen, a scholar-practitioner embedded in Asia's family office ecosystem, describes the Greater Bay Area, nine mainland cities plus Hong Kong and Macau, as a combination of technology and finance. An advocate for Hong Kong, he questions whether Hong Kong and Singapore are true competitors or co-builders of one Asian ecosystem, and sees Dubai and Abu Dhabi as the bigger challenge for attracting families.

Elaine Chow, who runs a single family office in Hong Kong, describes the city as both part of China and an important international hub, with common law, favourable taxation, accessible business set-up and strong deal flow. She expects the Greater Bay Area to bring younger talent as Hong Kong ages, and sees the city growing as an art marketplace.

We're becoming like Switzerland and in a good way.

— Elaine Chow, Wealth Office

Maryann Selfe adds a capital-markets dimension. She notes the rapid growth in single family offices in Singapore and Hong Kong, and sees Asian long-duration capital as a cross-border opportunity for European biotech, which she says has raised far less than its US counterparts.

Safe havens and second homes

Viewed from London, the map looks different again. Asked where to spend a hypothetical $100 million on a home, Gary Hersham chooses prime Belgravia, linking London's renewed standing as a safe haven to conflict in the Middle East and a sense of insecurity in Dubai and Abu Dhabi. The contrast with Jen's view of the Gulf as a strong competitor for families is worth noting. Irina Gamagina observes that wealthy clients rarely have a single residence and often hold homes in three or four countries. Both agents describe a shifting roll-call of buyers, including Chinese buyers who moved from small flats to very large homes, and both point to new centres, from Madrid and Milan to Zurich, Barcelona and Miami.

Philip Marcovici offers a caution about how long this freedom of movement will last. He distinguishes the mobility of wealth, of the entities that hold it and of the owner, and expects all three to become more restricted as exit taxes and limits on multiple citizenship spread. He singles out Singapore and Switzerland as places where wealth owners pay meaningful tax in exchange for security and a fair society.

Pearl Lam sees the shift in culture as well as capital. In her account, many young heirs in North America and Western Europe want experiences and do not want the cost and responsibility of inherited collections, while young people she meets in China, the rest of Asia and the Middle East want to build collections. Taken together, these conversations describe a map with several centres of gravity. Guests differ on which hubs will lead. They broadly agree that opportunity, security and trusted rules decide where wealth settles.