Artificial Intelligence and Its Impact on Trusts, Wealth, and the Places That Want Them
A strategist's field guide to the seven jurisdictions that will define wealth management in the coming decade — and the forces that are reshaping everything the trust industry thought it knew.
The trust industry is changing faster than at any point in the past century. The old centres are fading. New hubs are rising. The families and advisers who understand this new geography will protect their wealth. Those who do not will be left behind.
Strategic frameworks — SWOT, Porter's Five Forces, the Value Chain — applied to the trust industry with brutal honesty. Learn why profitability is declining and what to do about it.
A jurisdiction-by-jurisdiction guide that answers the three questions every settlor actually asks — in plain language, without the legal ceremony.
What AI, tokenisation, and the Great Wealth Transfer mean for the structures your family is about to inherit — and what trustees are not telling you about their own technology gap.
Each jurisdiction has its own character, its own strengths, and its own hidden costs. The book goes deep on all seven. Here is the strategic snapshot.
The most legally certain jurisdiction in Asia. World-class courts, professional regulator, and the VCC structure. Expensive, slow, and demanding — but it delivers.
The city that refuses to die. Lower cost than Singapore, faster approval, and irreplaceable China connectivity. The boomerang effect is real and growing.
Zero tax, fast execution, and a regulator that wants your business. The courtroom has never seen a trust dispute — which is either reassuring or alarming, depending on your risk tolerance.
The tanker, not the speedboat. Real case law. ADIA co-investment access. A regulator that measures success by the absence of failure. Slow, serious, and worth it.
Half the cost of Singapore. Available, experienced talent. The world's most developed Islamic wealth management ecosystem. The best-kept secret in the industry.
The world's only Islamic digital asset trust framework. Offshore flexibility with onshore Malaysian substance. Relationship-first, scale-limited, and uniquely positioned.
No trust law yet. But the PIF has hundreds of billions. The family office awakening is real. The first movers who build relationships now will own the market when the law passes.
Every action step, framework, and decision matrix from all 16 chapters — distilled into two engines. Input your situation. Get a structured strategic recommendation in seconds.
For families and settlors assessing which jurisdiction and structure fits their specific situation, priorities, and asset profile.
For trustees, private bankers, wealth managers, and estate planners analysing a client situation and building a structured recommendation.
Answer the questions below. Optionally paste meeting notes or a situation summary. The engine will recommend a jurisdiction, structure, and action checklist drawn from The New Trustees.
Or click to upload a PDF / Word document (meeting minutes, consultation notes)
For professional use. Input your client's profile and primary concern. The engine generates a structured recommendation drawn from the frameworks in The New Trustees — including jurisdiction, vehicle, structure type, and a prioritised action checklist.
Or click to upload meeting minutes, consultation notes, or a recorded transcript
These engines are strategic tools derived from The New Trustees. They do not constitute legal or financial advice. Always engage qualified professionals before making structural decisions.
Click any chapter to expand its full set of recommended actions — distilled from the book and indexed by topic.
The three questions every settlor actually asks — and why getting the human relationship right matters more than the legal drafting.
The five-question framework for choosing the right jurisdiction — and why the default is almost never the optimal answer.
What the Fujian overlay means in practice, why the VCC matters, and how to survive Singapore's compliance machinery.
Why zero tax comes with zero case law — and the dual-jurisdiction model that manages this risk without giving up the tax advantage.
Why Malaysia is half the cost of Singapore, how the Islamic trust framework works in practice, and the MM2H residency synergy.
The boomerang effect, the Evergrande hangover, and why Hong Kong still wins decisively for China-connected families despite everything.
Why the tanker beats the speedboat for institutional families — and how ADIA co-investment changes the calculus entirely.
The world's only Islamic digital asset trust framework — and why the relationship model of Labuan's boutique firms cannot be replicated anywhere else.
No trust law yet — but the PIF, the family office awakening, and the political will make this the most significant emerging market in the world.
Why SWOT is a listening discipline — not a diagram — and how to apply it across all seven jurisdictions in real time during a client meeting.
Why the trust industry's structural profitability is declining — all five forces moving in the wrong direction simultaneously — and what to do about it.
Why moving upstream without automating downstream destroys trust companies — and how Sterling Trust got it right when Stellar Group did not.
How geopolitical disruption permanently rewired compliance culture — and why the families that prepared before the crisis are the only ones who came through cleanly.
What the next generation of beneficiaries expects — and why most trust companies are completely unprepared to deliver it.
The three tokenisation models — and why only the trust container works for institutional money. Plus the convergence of AI and blockchain in trust administration.
…a different animal altogether. It is also, against all odds, a genuinely good read.
“Chan’s big idea is that a trust is not a product but a parachute — it only works if every part of the relationship holds. … For anyone navigating the intersection of family wealth and technological change, this is well worth your time.”
Most books about trusts are written by lawyers for lawyers. They parse statutes, footnote case law, and end up gathering dust. William Chan’s The New Trustees is a different animal altogether. Chan is a strategist, not a lawyer — and cheerfully says so. This is a book that treats the trust industry as a living, shifting landscape shaped by human fear, geopolitical upheaval, technology, and the messy realities of family life. It is also, against all odds, a genuinely good read.
Chan opens with a story that stays with you: a tin miner in Kuala Lumpur sets up a trust weeks before his death, not for tax reasons but for peace of mind. His widow calls Chan afterwards in tears — not of grief, but of relief. Chan’s big idea is that a trust is not a product but a parachute — it only works if every part of the relationship holds. The three questions he says keep every settlor up at night — Will my children fight? Will my spouse be taken care of? Will my money last? — are not legal questions. They are deeply human ones.
The heart of the book is a tour of seven trust hubs Chan believes will matter most: Singapore, Hong Kong, Dubai, Abu Dhabi, Malaysia, Labuan, and Saudi Arabia. He is not shy with his opinions. Singapore is the “overcrowded fortress.” Hong Kong is “the city that refuses to die.” Dubai is the “speedboat” — zero tax and fast, but with trust law that has never been tested in court. Malaysia is the book’s sleeper hit, presented as “the professional’s secret weapon.”
What lifts the book beyond a jurisdiction guide are the chapters where Chan takes business-school staples — SWOT, Porter’s Five Forces, the value chain — and applies them to the trust world with irreverence and practicality. His chapter on the “Value Chain Lie” challenges the consulting orthodoxy that trust firms should abandon administration for advisory. Chan says the opposite: automate the grunt work and the margins follow.
The later chapters tackle the forces reshaping the industry in real time: the Middle East conflict’s ripple effects, the coming generational wealth transfer, and the rise of AI and tokenisation. The story of “Jasmine,” a tech-savvy granddaughter who stops engaging with her family trust because the trustee cannot provide a mobile app, feels like a parable the whole industry needs to hear. For anyone navigating the intersection of family wealth and technological change, this is well worth your time.
— Frankie Ho, Consulting Editor, The Edge Singapore
"A rare blend of strategic foresight and practical, jurisdiction-by-jurisdiction advice. Chan understands that in today's fragmented world, a trust is not a product — it's a dynamic tool for resilience. This book has already changed how we evaluate counterparty structures in the Middle East and Asia."
"I've spent years explaining to families why their Singapore trust costs so much more than they expected. Chan's chapter on the boomerang effect alone is worth the price of admission. This book will become required reading for every new trust officer we hire."
"This is not a law book. It is a better book. I will be recommending it to every client who asks me where should I put my trust."
"We have tracked wealth migration from Europe to Asia and the Gulf for a decade. Chan has done something remarkable: he has turned that migration pattern into a playbook. Every private banker who wants to keep their clients' wealth in motion should read this."
"The most honest account of how the trust industry actually works that I have read in years. Chan has written the book that practitioners needed and did not have."
Available as eBook (USD $9.99) and Paperback (USD $24.99). Kindle Unlimited subscribers read free.