As Thailand’s private wealth market becomes more sophisticated, investment advice is entering a more sought-after phase. Clients are more exposed to the global level, are more selective in assessing value, and are more sensitive to differences between advice, execution and results. In that environment, money managers are no longer competing solely on access to products or market insight. They’re also competing on clarity: clarity of the offering, clarity of the process, and clarity in how they explain what makes their service really different. At the recent Habbis Wealth Management event in Thailand, a panel chaired by Paul Gambles, Director of MBMG-Trilec, a collaboration between Trilec Partners and MBMG Investment Advisory, examined how advisory firms are adapting to volatility, changing client expectations and the increasing complexity of portfolio construction. Gambles brought an insightful, questioning tone to the discussion, repeatedly emphasizing on the panel not only what they do, but also how clearly they communicate it. His comments reflect a broader challenge for the industry: Differentiation only makes sense if customers can actually understand it.
key takeaways
- Discrimination must be clearly explained: Gambles argued that many companies fail to articulate their proposition in a way that customers can easily understand.
- Strategy should not be abandoned for headlines: Volatility can create strategic opportunities, but long-term portfolio discipline remains central.
- changing customer demands: As portfolios become more global and complex, discretionary management becomes more open-ended.
- Product abundance does not equal suitability: Access to more solutions is of no value if the products are not truly customer-centric.
- Personal loans require caution:Gambles expressed concern about the quality of private loans held in client portfolios.
An industry that doesn’t always explain itself well
Gambles began the panel with perhaps its most important point. Before discussing portfolio positioning or market outlook, he asked panelists to explain “what is the difference between what they do and what their offering is”.
That question comes from experience. Reflecting on the background of MBMG’s own recent collaboration with Trilec, he described how clients struggled to understand the difference between discretionary portfolio management and the advice or consulting services already provided by their own business.
“We realized,” he said, “that we ourselves, and as an industry, can’t do the greatest job of really explaining what our proposition is.”
This observation goes far beyond marketing. In wealth management, firms often assume that terms like advisory, consulting and discretionary management are self-explanatory. In practice, clients may only see a blurry picture: they are paying for professional help with their portfolios, and the differences between models may seem semantic rather than real.
Gambles’s point was not that those distinctions are unimportant. Rather, it was that the industry often fails to translate them into clear, customer-facing language. In a more sophisticated market, this becomes a real problem. If customers don’t understand the structure of the service they are purchasing, it becomes harder for companies to justify the price, build trust and demonstrate why their model is fit for purpose.
volatility is not a strategy
When the discussion turned to geopolitics and market turmoil, Gambles again presented the issue in practical terms. He said recent events have unnerved clients, but also argued that volatility should not automatically trigger strategy changes.
Citing interactions with customers, he said that “if you have made the right strategy, there is no need to change the strategy now”.
At the same time, he was careful not to turn that principle into inaction. “There are certainly obviously strategic opportunities that situations like this bring up,” he said, “because pricing becomes chaotic when events occur.”
The balance between discipline and flexibility became a central theme of the panel. Gambles did not allow the discussion to remain ideological. He asked directly about what portfolio changes companies are actually making and what they are doing in response to the current environment.
That emphasis on implementation is important. Clients don’t pay consultants just to reiterate long-term visions. They want to know when volatility should be ignored, when it should be acted upon, and how these decisions are being made. Gambles’ approach suggested that the true test of advisory quality lies not in sustained activity, but in being able to distinguish noise from worthwhile opportunity.
gold and the question of correlation
The clearest example of Gambles’ desire to challenge conventional thinking came in the discussion on gold. While others defended the metal’s role in portfolios, he revealed his own company is reducing exposure.
“We have actually been selling gold for the last few days, even a few weeks,” he said, “simply because we are concerned about the correlation between gold and risk assets now.”
He added: “Gold is not what gold was, it is a different gold these days.”
This is a meaningful comment. Gold has long been regarded as a diversifier and crisis hedge, but the gambles raised questions about whether it is still playing that role as cleanly as investors believe. “Gold plays a different role in the portfolio,” he said. “We’re not saying people shouldn’t have it, but really it’s a risk asset and not a diversifier these days.”
Whether one agrees with that assessment or not, the underlying point is important. Asset classes cannot simply be placed in old narratives without scrutiny. Advisors should continue to test assumptions, especially as market structure and correlations evolve.
shift towards wisdom
Gambles also drew attention to how customer behavior is changing, particularly in relation to discretionary management. He asked whether companies were seeing “more of a shift toward discretionary,” reflecting a trend that appears to be gaining momentum in Thailand.
The answers revealed that clients, especially those with increasing international experience, are more willing to make day-to-day decisions. As portfolios become more complex, many no longer want to monitor global developments or constantly react to changing conditions.
This is more than a change in execution priority. This gives a new shape to the advisory relationship itself. The discretionary model requires stronger trust behind the mandate, clearer governance and greater confidence in the investment framework. In that sense, Gambles’ initial concern about explanation becomes even more relevant. If customers are to delegate more responsibility, they need to understand the proposition more clearly, not less.
reach is not enough
Gambles applied similar scrutiny to product selection. Discussing structured products, he acknowledged that the interest rate environment has made some structures more attractive. But he was sharply critical of most things mass marketed to consumers.
“We were bombarded with about 10,000 structured products that were being offered to everyone,” he said, “and they didn’t seem particularly customer-centric.”
That criticism reflects the broader issue of private property. Product proliferation is often confused with sophistication. Yet a large shelf of offerings is of no value if the products are not tailored to customer needs.
Gambles explained that the structured products his own company had recently purchased were “we designed them ourselves” and “specified them ourselves”. The implication was that better results often come from designing exposures tailored to the needs of the portfolio rather than selecting from among the most aggressively distributed ones in the market.
His argument was not anti-product. This was anti-liberalism. True consultant value lies not in offering more, but in filtering better.
Personal Loan and the Risk of Poor Packaging
The harshest warning from Gambles came on personal credit. “The thing that concerns me most in the client portfolio right now is probably private debt,” he said candidly.
He was careful to separate theory from practice. “There is nothing wrong with the asset class in principle,” he said. The problem, in his view, is the quality of what is being sold.
“There’s a lot of crap in people’s portfolios,” he commented, warning that weak private credit exposures have often been packaged for private clients without adequate scrutiny.
He made this point further by acknowledging that although there are many private credit managers who continue to offer high quality, “the things that get pushed into most client portfolios are not necessarily good managers”.
This concern speaks to a broader issue in money management today. As alternative investments become more fashionable and more commercialized, the line between genuine opportunity and weak packaging can easily blur. In that setting, the role of the advisor becomes more important, not less. Due diligence, manager selection and suitability testing all need to be strengthened as complexity increases.