Weinberg tackles U.S. market from Winnipeg base

(September 15, 2003) Marty Weinberg is confident his soon-to-be spun-off American company will become even larger than his recently-sold Canadian one. The Assante CEO is preparing for life in the ultra-competitive U.S. market after selling off his firm’s Canadian division to CI Fund Management last month.

“We retained the growth piece of our business in a non-listed company so we can re-execute our business plan in a market 15 times the size of Canada. From that perspective, shareholders get to hang on to try this one more time,” says Weinberg, adding recent discussions have convinced him his predictions for the U.S. firm are true.

“I can’t remember a time since entering the U.S. marketplace (nearly five years ago) that so many opportunities have come our way. We’ve had more in the last 30 days than in the previous three years. We are highly confident we’ll be able to meet or exceed our plan and achieve the kind of growth we experienced in Canada,” he says.

Assante USA has $1.4 billion in assets under management, several billion in assets under administration and more than 300 management and staff. It is dwarfed, for the time being anyway, by the Canadian operation’s $7 billion in assets under management, $17 billion in assets under administration and 1,200 financial advisors.

Weinberg will continue on as CEO of Assante until the $846-million deal to sell the Winnipeg-based firm to CI closes, likely in November.

His U.S. plan is to open integrated family offices in major centres across the country targeting accounts in excess of $1 million but with a primary market in the $5-million to $25-million range. They will expand the “personal CFO” concept first developed in Canada to include a comprehensive service offering, including wealth management, tax planning, insurance, real estate, mortgages, banking, intergenerational transfer of wealth, screening for domestic help, security services and full data aggregation of the household balance sheet.

The execution of the plan will have a fundamental difference from that which played out since Assante’s formation in 1995, he says. “We won’t be acquiring advisors with assets under administration and trying to earn the right to assets under management. We will recruit advisors straight into the assets under management, a direct sales force,” he says.

The company will also expand its focus beyond high-profile athletes and entertainers to include the CEO, executive and professional communities. “We expect that will be the majority of our business three years from today. The rate of growth in the family office world has never been higher. We believe we will capture a meaningful piece of that business,” he says.

Weinberg’s brain trust that helped Assante Canada become one of the most successful financial services firms in the country in the last year, Kish Kapoor as executive vice-president, Denis Taillieu as chief financial officer and Bruce Warnock as general counsel, will join him at the U.S. company.

Weinberg says he would like to take the company public at some point but he’s not in any rush. “In many ways this is similar to Assante in 1995. We were able to grow successfully as a non-listed company. The goals will be longer term. We’ll be in a position to do execute that without having to focus on a stock price trading off quarterly earnings,” he says, adding the company may do a private placement or equity offering in 2004.

He notes CI has provided a two-year transition period during which Weinberg will phase out the Assante name in the U.S. He says he is considering changing it to Loring Ward, or some derivative of the name originally registered by his father more than 40 years ago.

Weinberg says the company will be headquartered in Winnipeg with executive offices in New York and Los Angeles and he will split his time primarily between Winnipeg and Los Angeles. “I’m building a house in Winnipeg, I have a summer home (at Lake of the Woods) and my intention is to stay here. My kids are here, I have a family here. I’ll just travel,” he says.

Geoff Kirbyson is a financial services writer based in Winnipeg.