Julius Baer: Asia's Rich Heirs Have Least Say on Family Business Sales

By Amara Osei

Asia's ultra-wealthy next generation has the least say in what happens to the family business after it's sold, according to Julius Baer. That finding, reported by The Business Times, lands at the center of the region's biggest private-wealth question: who decides when the founding generation cashes out?

The Swiss private bank, which advises some of Asia's richest families, found that heirs — the children and younger relatives positioned to inherit — rank lowest in influence when families draw up post-sale plans for their businesses. The decision power sits elsewhere, with the founders and senior family members who built the companies.

The claim is narrow but pointed. In post-sale planning — the decisions covering what a family does with proceeds, structure and succession after divesting a business — the next generation in Asia gets less of a voice than any other stakeholder group Julius Baer examined.

What does the finding signal for Asia's family firms?

Asia's wealth is concentrated in founder-led businesses, many built in the past half-century and now approaching handover or exit. Banks including Julius Baer compete to advise these families on transitions, and the battleground is increasingly the next generation — the people who will hold the capital after the founders step away.

A finding that heirs have the least say on post-sale plans suggests the transfer of decision-making is lagging the transfer of wealth itself. Founders are selling, or planning to sell, while keeping the next generation at arm's length from the key structural choices.

For wealth managers, that gap is business. Advisers who can reach the next generation early — before the sale, not after — position themselves to manage the proceeds and the relationship for decades.

Why does the next-gen voice matter?

The finding from Julius Baer, as reported by The Business Times, frames a tension inside family enterprises. Post-sale plans determine whether proceeds stay in the family office, get redeployed into new ventures, or flow to the heirs' own projects. If the next generation has the least input, those plans may not reflect how the inheritors intend to deploy the capital.

Asia's ultra-wealthy families are also a distinct cohort from their Western peers. The region produces a large share of the world's new billionaires, and much of that fortune sits in operating companies rather than liquid portfolios. A sale converts an operating business into financial wealth — a moment when planning quality matters most.

Julius Baer's message to the market is that at this moment, in Asia, the people inheriting the wealth have the smallest seat at the table.

What happens next?

The finding points to a coming adjustment. As founders age and sales accelerate, banks and family offices will have to bring the next generation into post-sale planning earlier — or risk watching heirs move their inherited capital to advisers who did.

For now, the data says the region's greatest intergenerational wealth transfer is being planned largely without the generation that will receive it.