Two More JBWere Execs Join Asteri Asset Management

“Philanthropic and non-profit advice is one of the core pillars of Asteri’s independent, fee-for-service offering and we have started with the best in the field.”

Professional services and wealth management firm Asteri Asset Management has grown its overall team to 19 staff, including board members, following its establishment by former National Australia Bank (NAB) executives Peter Hensley and Warwick Traynor in December 2014.

The group yesterday said two of Australia’s top not-for-profit and philanthropic advisers, Damian Knowlton and Craig Whitfield, had come across from NAB’s JBWere business and were the latest partners to join the firm. Asteri Asset Management chief executive and former JBWere head Peter Hensley told financialobserver while several Asteri staff had previous ties to various businesses within NAB, team members had joined from a number of different groups, including ANZ Wealth, PricewaterhouseCoopers, Commonwealth Bank of Australia’s private wealth division, Citigroup, BNY Mellon and Centric Wealth.

Hensley said Knowlton and Whitfield were leaders in their space and had attracted more than $1 billion in funds under management and advice over the past three years at JBWere.

“Philanthropic and non-profit advice is one of the core pillars of Asteri’s independent, fee-for-service offering and we have started with the best in the field,” he said, pointing to Asteri’s other core pillars being strategic financial advice, investment strategy creation and intergenerational wealth. Knowlton, who has more than 25 years of experience in wealth management, including more than a decade at Perpetual, told financialobserver the not-for-profit and philanthropic space now had a lot more traction than 10 years ago.

He put that down to greater awareness and a bigger profile around giving, more media exposure and people re-evaluating wealth following the global financial crisis.

“Craig and I are passionate about providing advice to social capital investors in the philanthropic and non-profit sector and by joining Asteri Asset Management, we will be able to provide this service in an independent environment where we can offer objective advice and work in partnership with clients,” he said in a statement.

Further, he said charities, government, corporates and individuals had struggled to solve social problems in isolation, and they needed to look at new ways of working together to achieve successful outcomes.

Meanwhile, Hensley told financialobserver the business expected to name further adviser partnerships in the coming months and ideally it would like to have 40 advisers across Melbourne and Sydney over the next three years.

The publication reported at the end of January that Asteri believed establishing a Melbourne presence at some stage would make sense, but it would grow the business in a methodical and organised way.

Asteri Asset Management provides specialist advice to high net wealth families and executives of public and private companies, as well as not-for-profit organisations and philanthropists.

 

Read more at financialobserver.com.au/