Trusts need to be better leveraged by bankers who want more wealth management business, Chris Heilmann, managing director and fiduciary solutions executive for
US Trust said in his closing remarks during a session at the American Bankers Association’s annual Wealth Management and Trust Conference in Phoenix yesterday.

“A trust needs to be better positioned as a modern product,” Mr Heilmann said. “The platform must have relevance.”

“Clients lack awareness of the depth of service around trusts,” he continued. “We need to be doing a better job talking to clients who need solutions.”

The portability of trusts also presented a growth opportunity, Mr Heilmann said, as did the trend of more trusts having individual, rather than institutional, trustees.

“We need to do a better job working with individual trustees,” he told the attendees, who, he added, “could be a good feeder business for us.”

Mr Heilmann also reiterated the importance of the bank’s fiduciary standard in the post-Madoff environment, echoing Monday’s presentation at the conference by Dave Coffaro, chief fiduciary officer and head of trust and fiduciary services for Wells Fargo Wealth Management.

“Being a fiduciary is what we do well, and we should we proud of it,” Mr Heilmann said.