Goirigolzarri: "Bankia Banca Privada has increased managed customer funds by 26% in the last year"

• 'The trend in wealth management is a good example of the transformation that is taking place in the Bank'
• 'Our focus will be the customer - listening to and serving the customer,' said Goirigolzarri, who emphasised that Bankia's success 'is only possible thanks to the customers, who continue to place their trust in us'

Bankia Banca Privada has increased the volume of managed customer funds by 26% in the last year, group chairman José Ignacio Goirigolzarri announced during the closing ceremony of the conference on 'Family business and wealth: situation in a changing environment', organized in Madrid by Bankia Banca Privada and the newspaper Expansion.

For Goirigolzarri, 'this trend in wealth management is a good example of the transformation that is taking place in the Bank' and, together with the progress made by the Group as a whole, 'gives us confidence that we will achieve our goal, which is to maximise the value of Bankia and so be able to pay back the aid to Spanish taxpayers'.

'To that end, we have redoubled our commitment to continue to work to the highest professional standards, so that Bankia continues to be the most profitable, most solvent and most efficient bank in Spain,' said Goirigolzarri, who explained that, to make this possible, 'the focus will be the customer - listening to and serving the customer'.

'Our aim is for consumers to see our bank as being close, simple and transparent. That is the positioning we aspire to and it will require that we take consistent, continuous action over the next few years,' such as the initiative announced on 11 January to waive fees and commissions for customers who have their income paid directly into an account at the Bank, he declared.

The Bankia chairman said he was convinced that the Bank is on the right track, but he made it clear that 'this success is only possible thanks to the customers, who continue to place their trust in us. Without it, nothing would be possible.' He therefore promised to 'continue to earn that trust'.

Goirigolzarri stated that Bankia Banca Privada 'is a model of excellence in specialised wealth management and integrated advisory services'. And 'in the context of market uncertainty, coupled with tax and regulatory change, having good advice is more important than ever,' he said.

Besides specialised investment managers, the Bank also has an estate planning team specialised in designing the protocols that are needed in order to govern relations between the owners of family firms and in providing appropriate tax and wealth advice to preserve family wealth and pass it on efficiently to following generations, two crucial factors for family wealth.

Bankia's corporate director of Private Banking and Asset Management, Jaime González Lasso de la Vega, explained that for the last three years Bankia Banca Privada has increased its managed customer funds in the Community of Madrid at rates of around 30% per year.

'Madrid is the region in which Bankia Banca Privada has the most business, the most assets under management and the largest number of customers,' said González, who revealed that three out of every four customers consulted in Madrid consider that their account manager at Bankia delivers better service than they receive at other Spanish banks. 'Only 6.8% are of the opposite opinion,' he noted.