On his mission to pull UBS Group into the digital age. CEO Ralph Hamers is turning to one of the most successful women in adviser fintech.
The wirehouse announced Tuesday that Naureen Hassan would succeed Tom Naratil as president of UBS Americas when Naratil steps down in October. Hassan, whom InvestmentNews recognized as an industry leader in 2019, most recently served as chief operating officer of the Federal Reserve Bank of New York, but Hamers seems particularly interested in her extensive experience in technology.
UBS paid $1.4 billion for robo-advice startup Wealthfront in January, and Hamers has been outspoken about his vision to leverage digital channels to expand UBS’s U.S. wealth management business. An internal memo to employees made clear that technology will be a top priority for Hassan.
“She will lead our strategic growth and digital initiatives in the Americas region, including the transformation of the firm’s Wealth Management Americas Platform, expansion of digitally customized banking services, implementation of the Wealthfront acquisition upon closure and the rollout of UBS Circle One in the region,” Hamers wrote in the memo obtained by InvestmentNews.
UBS declined a request for additional comment.
Hassan led the Charles Schwab Corp. team that in 2015 launched Intelligent Portfolios, the first direct-to-consumer, purely digital robo-adviser developed by a brokerage firm. The service crossed $500 million in AUM in just three weeks and is now one of the largest digital advice providers.
In 2016, Morgan Stanley hired Hassan for the newly created position of chief digital officer for wealth management to oversee technology for the firm’s clients and financial advisers. Before leaving for the New York Fed in 2021, she led a strategy that brought together Morgan Stanley’s proprietary software, third-party fintech vendors and big-ticket acquisitions like ETrade and Solium into a tightly integrated digital ecosystem.
“Naureen has a unique skill set including digital wealth management, which will be key to UBS's next 10 years, including its recent purchase of Wealthfront,” said April Rudin, founder and CEO of wealth marketing firm The Rudin Group.
The Wealthfront deal makes Hassan a somewhat ironic choice for UBS. The startup originally pitched itself as a disruptive alternative to traditional Wall Street firms. Though it was previously complimentary of Schwab, Wealthfront went on the offensive following the launch of Intelligent Portfolios.
Former Wealthfront CEO Adam Nash wrote a blog post claiming that Intelligent Portfolios offered inferior tax-loss harvesting technology, and another that accused Schwab of deceiving investors by marketing the robo-adviser as free. Seven years later, Schwab paid $187 million to settle charges from the Securities and Exchange Commissions that it didn’t properly disclose how Intelligent Portfolios used cash to generate revenue.
“When I joined Wealthfront, I held up Charles Schwab as an example of a different type of company, a company with values to which we might aspire,” Nash wrote in 2016. “Much to my dismay, I now find myself hoping we never lose our identity the way Charles Schwab has.”
Now Hassan, the leader of the Schwab team that created and launched Intelligent Portfolios, will oversee the integration of Wealthfront into a traditional Wall Street firm.
In addition to her technology experience, Hassan’s hiring to an executive leadership position at a wirehouse is a step forward for diversity in the industry, Rudin said.
“It's great to see UBS replace a white male with a woman of color,” she said. “Naureen is an extremely impressive choice and represents the future of wealth management.”
[More: Take 5: Naureen Hassan talks integration, aggregation and retaining brokers at Morgan Stanley]
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