Spooked investors swamp wealth managers with coronavirus calls - reports

Wealth managers told the paper they had experienced spikes in the number of calls from investors this week.

Some UK advisers said their call volumes were up more than 30% even taking into account the upcoming end of the tax year. Many are replacing phone calls with face-to-face video calls as they shift to home working, the report said.

It added some managers were hosting daily or weekly calls to ease communication as they attempt to answers client questions.

"When the market is going up your phone doesn't ring a heck of a lot," said Scott Wren, senior global market strategist for Wells Fargo Investment Institute in the US. "When there are downturns, that's when your phone starts ringing."

He said the most common questions from clients had been "Where's the bottom?" and "Are we going to have a recession?" 

"Prior to this, it was all about elections and how much further the market is going to go up," he added. 

The FT said the crisis had "flummoxed" investors ranging from small stock pickers to the most affluent private banking customers.

Credit Suisse's private bank - which deals mainly with high net worth and ultra high net worth clients - had set up ad hoc investor phone calls in multiple languages following large market falls.

They have proved incredibly popular, said Daniel Imhof, deputy head of global investment management at Credit Suisse said.

"Most clients do not panic, but most are looking to have a constant dialogue about the situation. They all want to talk."

 

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