Wealth management in the context of "Shares"

Standard Chartered PLC is a British multinational bank with operations in wealth management, corporate and investment banking, and treasury services. Despite being headquartered in the United Kingdom, it does not conduct retail banking in the UK, and around 90% of its profits come from Asia, Africa, and the Middle East.

Standard Chartered has a primary listing on the London Stock Exchange and is a constituent of the FTSE 100 Index. It has secondary listings on the Hong Kong Stock Exchange, the National Stock Exchange of India, and OTC Markets Group Pink. Its largest shareholder is the Government of Singapore–owned Temasek Holdings. The Financial Stability Board considers it a systemically important bank.

UBS Group AG (stylized simply as UBS) is a Swiss multinational investment bank and financial services firm founded and based in Switzerland, with headquarters in both Zurich and Basel. It holds a strong foothold in all major financial centres as the largest Swiss banking institution and the world's largest private bank. UBS manages the largest amount of private wealth in the world, counting approximately half of The World's Billionaires among its clients, with over US$6 trillion in assets (AUM). Based on international deal flow and political influence, the firm is considered one of the "biggest, most powerful financial institutions in the world". UBS is also a leading market maker and one of the eight global 'Bulge bracket' investment banks. Due to its large presence across the Americas, EMEA and Asia–Pacific markets, the Financial Stability Board considers it a global systemically important bank and UBS is widely considered to be the largest and most sophisticated "truly global investment bank" in the world, given its market-leading positions in every major financial centre globally.

UBS investment bankers and private bankers are known for their strict bank–client confidentiality and culture of banking secrecy. Apart from private banking, UBS provides wealth management, asset management and investment banking services for private, corporate and institutional clients with international service. The bank also maintains numerous underground bank vaults, bunkers and storage facilities for gold bars around the Swiss Alps and internationally. UBS acquired rival Credit Suisse in an emergency rescue deal brokered by the Swiss government and its Central bank in 2023, following which UBS' AUM increased to over $5 trillion along with an increased balanced sheet of $1.6 trillion.

The Goldman Sachs Group, Inc. (/sæks/ SAKS) is an American multinational investment bank and financial services company. Founded in 1869, Goldman Sachs is headquartered in Lower Manhattan in New York City, with regional headquarters in many international financial centers. Goldman Sachs is the largest investment bank in the world by revenue and is ranked 55th on the Fortune 500 list of the largest United States corporations by total revenue. In the Forbes Global 2000 of 2024, Goldman Sachs ranked 23rd. It is considered a systemically important financial institution by the Financial Stability Board.

Goldman Sachs offers services in investment banking (advisory for mergers and acquisitions and restructuring), securities underwriting, prime brokerage, asset management, and wealth management. It is a market maker for many types of financial products and provides clearing and custodian bank services. It operates private-equity funds and hedge funds. It structures complex and tailor-made financial products. It also owns Goldman Sachs Bank USA, a direct bank. It trades both on behalf of its clients (flow trading) and for its own account (proprietary trading). The company invests in and arranges financing for startups, and in many cases gets additional business as bookrunner when the companies launch initial public offerings.

The Bank of America Corporation (Bank of America; often abbreviated BAC or BofA) is an American multinational investment bank and financial services holding company headquartered at the Bank of America Corporate Center in Charlotte, North Carolina, with investment banking and auxiliary headquarters in Manhattan. The bank was founded by the merger of NationsBank and Bank of America in 1998. It is the second-largest banking institution in the United States and the second-largest bank in the world by market capitalization, both after JPMorgan Chase. Bank of America is one of the Big Four banking institutions of the United States. and one of eight systemically important financial institutions in the United States. It serves about 10 percent of all American bank deposits, in direct competition with JPMorgan Chase, Citigroup, and Wells Fargo. Its primary financial services revolve around commercial banking, wealth management, and investment banking.Through mergers, the oldest branch of the Bank of America franchise dates back to 1784, when Massachusetts Bank was chartered, becoming the first federally chartered joint-stock-owned bank in the United States. Another branch of its history goes back to the American-based Bank of Italy, founded by Amadeo Pietro Giannini in 1904, which provided various banking services to Italian immigrants who faced service discrimination at the time. Headquartered in San Francisco, California, Giannini acquired Banca d'America e d'Italia in 1922 and eventually did business as Bank of America.

In the 1950s, the passage of landmark federal banking legislation facilitated rapid growth, quickly establishing prominent shares for the present bank's predecessors. After suffering significant losses during the 1998 Russian financial crisis, BankAmerica, as it was then known, was acquired by the Charlotte-based NationsBank for $62 billion. Following what was then the largest bank acquisition in history, the Bank of America Corporation was founded. Through a series of mergers and acquisitions, it built upon its commercial banking business by establishing Merrill Lynch for wealth management and Bank of America Merrill Lynch for investment banking in 2008 and 2009, respectively, and since renamed BofA Securities.

Barclays PLC (/ˈbɑːrkliz/, occasionally /-leɪz/) is a British multinational universal bank, headquartered in London, England. Barclays operates as five divisions: the UK Consumer Bank, UK Corporate Bank, Private Bank and Wealth Management (PBWM), Investment Bank, and the US Consumer Bank.

Barclays traces its origins to the goldsmith banking business established in the City of London in 1690. James Barclay became a partner in the business in 1736. In 1896, twelve banks in London and the English provinces, including Goslings Bank, Backhouse's Bank and Gurney, Peckover and Company, united as a joint-stock bank under the name Barclays and Co. Over the following decades, Barclays expanded to become a nationwide bank. In 1967, Barclays deployed the world's first cash dispenser. Barclays has made numerous corporate acquisitions, including of London, Provincial and South Western Bank in 1918, British Linen Bank in 1919, Mercantile Credit in 1975, the Woolwich in 2000 and the North American operations of Lehman Brothers in 2008.

Private banking is a general description for banking, investment and other financial services provided by banks and financial institutions primarily serving high-net-worth individuals (HNWIs) – those with very high income or substantial assets. Private banking is presented by those who provide such services as an exclusive subset of wealth management services, provided to particularly affluent clients. The term "private" refers to customer service rendered on a more personal basis than in mass-market retail banking, usually provided via dedicated bank advisers. It has typically consisted of banking services (deposit taking and payments), discretionary asset management, brokerage, limited tax advisory services and some basic concierge services, typically offered through a gateway provided by a single designated relationship manager.

Julius Baer Group Ltd. (German: Julius Bär Gruppe AG) is a Swiss multinational private banking and financial services firm headquartered in Zurich, Switzerland. Specializing in wealth management, investment advisory services, real estate financing, and selective trading services, it is one of the world’s largest dedicated private banks, with CHF 497.4 billion in managed assets as of 2024. It is listed on the SIX Swiss Exchange (ticker: BAER) and is a constituent of the Swiss Market Index Mid (SMI MID).

Founded in 1890, the bank originated as a family-run exchange office and later evolved into a public company. It operates in 28 countries and employs more than 7,500 staff globally. Julius Baer is noted for its traditional Swiss banking values, including a strong emphasis on client confidentiality.

Merrill Lynch, Pierce, Fenner & Smith Incorporated, doing business as Merrill, and previously branded Merrill Lynch, is an American investment management and wealth management division of Bank of America. Along with BofA Securities, the investment banking arm, both firms engage in prime brokerage and broker-dealer activities. The firm is headquartered in New York City, and once occupied the entire 34 stories of 250 Vesey Street, part of the Brookfield Place complex in Manhattan. Merrill employs over 14,000 financial advisors and manages $2.8 trillion in client assets ($3.4 trillion for Global Wealth and Investment Management). The company also operates Merrill Edge, a division for investment and related services, including call center counsultancy.

Prior to 2009, the company was publicly owned and traded on the New York Stock Exchange. Merrill Lynch & Co. agreed to be acquired by Bank of America on September 14, 2008, at the height of the 2008 financial crisis, the same weekend that Lehman Brothers was allowed to fail. The acquisition was completed in January 2009 and Merrill Lynch & Co., Inc. was merged into Bank of America Corporation in October 2018, with certain Bank of America subsidiaries continuing to carry the Merrill Lynch name, including the broker-dealer Merrill Lynch, Pierce, Fenner & Smith. In 2019, Bank of America rebranded the unit to "Merrill".

The Bear Stearns Companies, Inc. was an American investment bank, securities trading, and brokerage firm that famously failed during the 2008 financial crisis and the Great Recession. After its closure, it was subsequently sold to JPMorgan Chase. The company's main business areas before its failure were capital markets, investment banking, wealth management, and global clearing services, and it was heavily involved in the subprime mortgage crisis.

In the years leading up to the failure, Bear Stearns was heavily involved in securitization and issued large amounts of asset-backed securities which were, in the case of mortgages, pioneered by Lewis Ranieri, "the father of mortgage securities." As investor losses mounted in those markets in 2006 and 2007, the company actually increased its exposure, especially to the mortgage-backed assets that were central to the subprime mortgage crisis. In March 2008, the Federal Reserve Bank of New York provided an emergency loan to try to avert a sudden collapse of the company. The company could not be saved, however, and was sold to JPMorgan Chase for $10 per share, a price far below its pre-crisis 52-week high of $133.20 per share, but not as low as the $2 per share originally agreed upon.