IG Wealth Management looks to become one-stop shop

IN FIRST PERSON

Between the war in Ukraine, burgeoning inflation, and crypto’s Black Tuesday moment in May, Canada’s business community is having a volatile year.

Yet amid all of this financial turmoil, IG Wealth Management is humming along.

The Winnipeg-headquartered wealth management firm has more than 3,200 advisers serving a million plus clients across Canada — and its first-quarter results were impressive.

As of the end of March, the firm had $116.3 billion in assets under advisement — down slightly from the previous December, but nine per cent higher than the same time in 2021.

IG Wealth Management does everything from optimizing clients’ tax planning to preparing for retirement to business succession planning.

It also promotes financial literacy, works with rich families on intergenerational wealth, and helps clients with charitable giving. Damon Murchison, president and CEO of IG Wealth Management, says the firm can’t be all things to all people, but becoming a one-stop shop for wealth management is definitely the goal.

Murchison spoke to the Star about how the COVID-19 pandemic is forcing Canadians to confront tough financial questions, the firm’s deep roots in Winnipeg, and what IG Wealth Management thinks about crypto.

Last year was a very positive year from a stock market perspective. Our view is that it’s going to be a moderate year. We do need to make

sure we get a hold of inflation.

It was to be expected that the central banks in Canada and the United States were going to move. This is something we’ve known was coming. I think it’s going to give everyone a chance to reset.

There are some good things that can come from it.

Housing in this country, as you know, is not affordable for a lot of Canadians. Some of the measures the government is taking — rate increases — hopefully get rid of a bit of speculation and that housing gets a little bit more affordable, especially for younger generations.

When things are going well, it’s easy for Canadians to feel it’ll last in perpetuity, because people tend to extrapolate. That’s never the case. Never has there been a time when Canadians have asked themselves more tough questions about their financial futures than they are today.

A lot of Canadians are worried they can’t afford to retire or buy a house. How do you attract clients who may not have any retirement savings or simply see wealth management as a service for rich people?

It starts with understanding who your clients are and who your community is.

We provide financial guidance, financial literacy, financial advice, and financial planning across the nation in different forms. When you take a look at what we call Empower Your Tomorrow, which is a program that we really believe in, we are reaching out to people and providing them the basics of financial literacy.

How do you fill in your taxes? Which tax credits can I qualify for? How do I fill out a job application? How do I fill in a university or college application?

We work in communities with those that we believe are the highest risk — newcomers to the country, youth, seniors, and Indigenous people — to really help them with the basics of financial literacy. Then, as you become a client, we will work with you on financial education, which eventually leads to financial planning.

Those three things will lead to financial well-being and financial confidence. If you’ve been working with an adviser for a number of years and they know your circumstances, you’re able to build that into a comprehensive, individualized plan.

Even if people have a lot of financial literacy, they just don’t have the money to put away for retirement. We don’t have pensions like we used to in the 1950s and 1960s. Do your clients ever worry about that?

There’s a lot of Canadians worried about that. But I look back to when I was growing up and I had the exact same issues. I was living paycheque to paycheque. You have your college or university debt. You’re making money and you have a job, but you don’t have enough to move out by yourself.

So you get a roommate, or you live at home.

We’re having these conversations with our clients right now. A lot of it is, quite frankly, dealing with their parents.

All of the studies right now will show you that the Bank of Mom and Dad is in full force. Canadians view wealth as family wealth more than ever before.

They’re looking from an intergenerational wealth standpoint — how can I help my kids save for their first home? How can I help my kids pay off their education debt? How can I help my kids with X, Y, and Z? And we’re not talking about small sums of money here.

I think, on average, Canadians are passing on $130,000 to $140,000 to help their kids purchase their first property. Generally, families have more money and more wealth to pass on to their kids today than they did 10 years ago, 15 years ago, 25 years ago.

The key here is — can the parents work with an advisery that specializes in helping with all of the things I’ve talked about? Financial literacy on the other side of the scale for, let’s just call it a “high net work family,” is knowing how and when to bring the kids into a conversation about the family’s wealth. How do they have these conversations? What do they not talk to their kids about? These are all things we help our clients with.

Would IG Wealth Management ever consider moving its headquarters from Winnipeg?

No. We’re a Winnipeg-based organization. We have strong ties to Winnipeg and to Manitoba — and we’re very proud of those ties.

Many Canadians are considering investing in crypto. Does IG Wealth Management have a position on this?

Every one of our sub-advisers will make up their own mind. If crypto deserves a place in their roster of investments, we allow them to make the decisions. Some will have it, some won’t.

We know that Canadians are generally more interested in accessing digital assets than ever before, including crypto.

We want to make sure that our clients have access to crypto. We have a wide range of ETFs that provide exposure to this area. And we’re flexible. If a client wants a specific type of exposure and they understand that exposure, we can certainly provide it.

The key is making sure Canadians understand what crypto does to your overall portfolio from a riskreturn perspective. Crypto and these types of investments are exciting and they’re relatively new, but with anything exciting and relatively new, there tends to be a lot of volatility.

You just have to have to the stomach to be able to invest in these things for a long period of time.

Given all the doom and gloom around the economic future of our country right now, why do you think IG Wealth Management is doing so well?

There are two things I’ll point to. No. 1, there was a lot of stimulus in the marketplace because Canadians weren’t travelling. Our savings rate grew dramatically as a country. Canadians had more money to invest because they were saving, not spending.

That is one of the reasons, but that is something everyone could benefit from.

Why was IG Wealth Management benefiting from it? COVID has forced a lot of Canadians to stop and think about their life and their future. They’ve had time to digest it and look around.

They’ve had time to talk to their friends, they’ve had time to talk to their family members.

And they’ve had time to talk to their accountants and lawyers.

What we’re seeing right now is that the demand for advice to build a plan that covers all aspects of life has never been higher.

Before COVID, the demand for advice was there, but most people just wanted to talk about their investments. Face it, investments are sexy.

Now, Canadians want to find answers for the tough questions that they know they can’t answer themselves.

They’re looking for advice. At IG Wealth Management, our entire organization — our model, our culture, our people — are designed to answer those questions.

‘‘ On average, Canadians are passing on $130,000 to $140,000 to help their kids purchase their first property.

DAMON MURCHISON IG WEALTH MANAGEMENT