(Bloomberg) — Goldman Sachs Group Inc.’s top executive at its wealth venture with China’s biggest bank is leaving and may join a Japanese rival, people familiar with the matter said, as foreign firms struggle to gain a foothold in the country’s asset management market amid deepening economic strains.
Alex Wang, chief executive officer of Goldman Sachs ICBC Wealth Management, will step down after almost 15 years at Goldman’s asset management affiliate in China, the people said, asking not to be identified because the matter isn’t public. He has been in discussions to join Nomura Holdings Inc. with a similar role to run its securities venture business, the people said, asking not to be identified.
Goldman will replace Wang with Zhang Yumeng, who took up a job as managing director of China at investment research firm Morningstar Inc. in January, one of the people said. He was formerly head of China at Legal & General Group, having also worked at Ping An Asset Management and Mercer International. The appointment is subject to regulatory approval.
Goldman Sachs’ spokeswoman in Hong Kong declined to comment. Wang, who was also previously head of private wealth management in China onshore at Gao Hua Securities Co., didn’t respond to requests for comment. Zhang and Industrial & Commercial Bank of China Ltd. couldn’t be reached for comment outside business hours.
Wang’s departure comes three years after Goldman’s 51%-owned venture was allowed to roll out wealth management services in 2022. Although the tie-up with ICBC will aid product distribution on the mainland, it remains unclear how much it will overlap or compete with the Chinese lender’s own wealth management unit, one of the people said.
Global firms have launched wholly-owned fund management units in China, but scaling up has proved difficult amid a sluggish stock market and intense competition from powerful domestic players that offer tailored, lower-cost products. Western firms may find it challenging to match the deep-rooted networks and regulatory rapport that the local incumbents have enjoyed, while a regulatory push to lower management fees has further squeezed margins.
New York-based Goldman’s China wealth push was built on expectations of rising demand from a growing affluent class. It previously estimated Chinese households will have 450 trillion yuan ($63 trillion) in investable assets by 2030, with around 60% flowing into non-deposit products such as securities, mutual funds, and bank wealth management, according to a 2021 announcement when it established the venture with ICBC.
But demand has waned as consumers hoard cash amid a prolonged property slump and mounting US–China tensions, sharply curbing investment appetite. The Goldman ICBC venture manages 28.2 billion yuan as of December 2024 and has launched over 100 products, including cross border investments under the qualified domestic institutional investor program，RMB fixed income, and quantitative strategies.
Meanwhile, Nomura has scaled back its original focus on China wealth, cutting staffing by about two-thirds in the business over the past two years to prioritize an expansion in brokerage and asset management in the world’s second largest economy, people familiar said earlier.
The Tokyo-based firm has been seeking a new chief executive officer for its securities business in China for months as its joint venture faces pressure to revive its performance after posting losses every year since it was formed in 2019. While it was confident that its expertise of catering to rich Japanese would help give it an edge in China, its wealth business push has teetered under President Xi Jinping’s “common prosperity” drive, a slowing economy and stiff competition.
Rival UBS Group AG last year also postponed plans to build its own mutual fund business in China due to the large capital commitment and a dim profit outlook, people familiar with the matter have said. The bank had been contemplating a stand-alone fund platform after China lifted foreign ownership restrictions in 2020.
(Adds AUM in 8th paragraph.)
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