US Tourists Flock to Portugal 

How / why did you get into your line of work in the financial services sector?

Back in 2007, I was looking for a new challenge and saw an advertisement for a trainee financial advisor role in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. Without informing my family or even my girlfriend at the time, I applied and a couple of interviews later and I was offered the job. I flew out there with my girlfriend and ultimately it turned into a lifechanging 5 years. Here I am still doing the job I love 14 years later!

On many occasions, lay investors have a tendency to confuse banking and property revenues as useful gauges of the overall strength of the investment economy. But, however healthy (or unhealthy) these two sectors appear, this should not be allowed to cloud the investment opportunity available to you via your expat financial services manager.

This is why we should not be overly concerned that returns in banking investments currently sit below historical averages – what this potentially marks is simply the residual impact of the 2008 financial crisis and the fact that banking and the wider investment economy have evolved with the advent of new and disruptive players in the finance sector.

For example, a new piece of research by Accenture showed that in 2005 there were 24,000 firms operating in the worldwide banking industry; today this stands at around 15,000. But this alone cannot be seen as a true reflection of the current climate because during the same period we have witnessed the dawn of 600 FinTech firms, 1,900 payment institutions, 700 new banks, and 400 subsidiaries of existing banks – there has also been some consolidation in the area.