Marco (54) is a U.S. financial executive living in New York City, and his wife Lorraine (52) owns an art gallery in lower Manhattan. Marco, a second-generation Italian American, and Lorraine have two grown children and another entering her junior year at a U.S. college. Marco grew up in a working-class neighborhood in Brooklyn, excelling in public schools and earning a scholarship to the University of Pennsylvania. He then rose through the ranks of an investment bank, eventually becoming head of sales and research before taking a buyout in 2019 that, along with stock options and real estate holdings, left him with ample assets for retirement. His next priority is finding a new wealth manager to assist in diversifying his primarily U.S.-based equity holdings and monetizing some of his real estate holdings.
Lorraine is contemplating selling her gallery after it was vandalized during riots in 2020 in response to police violence and calls for racial equality and has seen little traffic due to a growing homeless problem in the Tribeca neighborhood where the gallery is located. She and Marco have discussed setting up permanent residence outside the U.S. once their youngest daughter graduates from college.
Challenges
- Marco has grown disgruntled with the sharp political and social divisions that have emerged in the U.S.
- He is concerned that the U.S. is becoming overly reliant on big government and social programs versus the hard work and meritocracy that led to his success and that of many of his peers on Wall Street in the 1990s and 2000s.
- He is also concerned that overly accommodative U.S. fiscal and monetary policies will lead to unmanageable deficits (currently $30 trillion and rising) that will permanently weaken the U.S. dollar.
Solution
By working with LFA, Marco and Lorraine can diversify their U.S.-based holdings to hedge against potential dollar debasement and political unrest, while gaining exposure to new growth opportunities outside of the U.S. Our network of Swiss banks provides them access to Swiss franc-denominated accounts and hedges against the currency risk of holding all their assets in U.S. dollars.