Lehman Collapse Inspired a Banker to Find a Purpose for Wealth
Angela Mwanza, co-founder of UBS’s Evergreen Wealth Management, says she now defines success as transferring capital and a mission from one generation to the next.
As a wealth manager, Angela Mwanza likes to be prepared for any risk, even on her days off. She recalls a recent visit with her husband and young son to a reptile park in her home country, Zambia, where she’d mused over the deadly consequences of running into some of the venomous residents. “If you see a spitting cobra, put on some glasses,” she suggests. A penchant for planning and unflappability are good traits to have if you’re in Mwanza’s line of work. She’s co-founder of UBS Group AG’s New York-based Evergreen Wealth Management, a nine-person team that manages $1.2 billion for 25 ultrahigh-net-worth families.
Mwanza, 49, grew up in Zambia in the 1970s as tanking copper prices rocked the economy. “Shortages and blackouts,” she says, “they do kind of prepare you in a way that nothing fazes you.” Education and family ties took Mwanza to Germany—her mother’s homeland—for college, and finally to Cornell in the U.S. for business school, where her father had earned his doctorate in economics. Jacob Mumbi Mwanza was governor of the Bank of Zambia (1995-2002) after serving as secretary for the Zambia Ministry of Finance. In an interview, Mwanza talks about the risks to consider for 2020 and some of the findings from UBS’s Billionaires Insights 2019 report. She also shares why her clients like impact investing, how to prepare younger generations to take on a family mission, and why diversity is a business imperative for wealth management.