Family D · Wealth and private banking · Coming soon
Private Wealth Management Certification
Wealth is not inherited. It is structured, protected and passed on.
Learn. Apply. Profit.
Notice
Private Wealth Management Certification carries no regulatory recognition. It does not replace the AMIB Figure 3 certification or any other that CNBV requires to operate in the securities market.
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01 — ABSTRACTPrivate Wealth Management Certification
Latin America is home to roughly 587,000 high-net-worth individuals holding USD 9.2 trillion, and Mexico's CNBV registry of investment advisers lists 154 registrants. The problem sits between those two figures. The region's wealth is structured, moved and inherited through bankers and advisers whom no credential requires to prove command of cross-border tax, the fideicomiso or the governance of a business-owning family. The intergenerational transfer now under way, estimated at USD 124 trillion through 2048, turns what was desirable into something urgent.
Private Wealth Management Certification is the RiskMathics Certificate Institute credential for professionals who advise on, structure and manage substantial private wealth. Three levels track a real career in the field. Level I certifies the foundations: markets and products, portfolio construction, client profiling, tax fundamentals and the regulatory frameworks of Latin America and the United States. Level II certifies applied advisory: cross-border structuring, trusts, succession, alternatives and digital assets. Level III certifies wealth architecture for UHNW clients and family offices. The exam can be taken with or without the preparation program.
Global wealth management credentials are taught in English and reason from US or UK tax law; local ones are regulatory minimums that never reach the fideicomiso de control, the South Dakota trust or the Luxembourg SPF. None covers, in Spanish, the corridors through which Latin American wealth actually moves. This certification is built in that gap: the program is delivered by the Private Wealth Management Institute, the group's private banking and wealth institute; the exam is built, audited and administered by an independent certifier.
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02 — INDUSTRYWhat is happening in the industry
The Capgemini World Wealth Report 2025 puts Latin America at roughly 587,000 HNWIs holding USD 9.2 trillion, led by Brazil and Mexico with around 365,000 and 367,000 millionaires. The region lost 8.5 % of its HNWI population in 2024 to currency depreciation and fiscal instability, yet ten-year projections point to growth: Brazil +45 %, Mexico +50 %, Colombia +60 %, Chile +65 %. UBS expects Brazil to pass close to USD 9 trillion between generations over 20 to 25 years, the second-largest transfer in the world.
Credentials have not kept pace with the wealth. Mexico has 154 investment advisers registered with CNBV; AMIB's Figure 3, the closest local certification to wealth management, is a four-hour exam designed as a regulatory minimum. Brazil's ANBIMA has certified more than 410,000 professionals, in Portuguese and for its own market. South America counts around 190 single family offices against 3,180 in North America; 48 % of relationship managers worldwide are expected to retire by 2040, and 81 % of inheritors plan to switch advisers after inheriting.
Regulatory complexity is growing faster than training. Mexico's July 2025 reform of the LFPIORPI cut the beneficial-ownership threshold from 50 % to 25 % and set suspicious-transaction reporting at 24 hours. The expanded CRS and the Crypto-Asset Reporting Framework (CARF) took effect on 1 January 2026. Singapore tightened its incentives and now hosts more than 2,000 family offices. HNWIs allocate 15 % to alternatives and family offices 30 to 50 %; 43 % of family offices suffered a cyberattack in the past two years.
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03 — WHYWhy this certification
A private banker in the region currently chooses among credentials that measure something else. The regulatory certification shows the holder may operate in the securities market; the CFA, investment analysis; the CFP, general financial planning. The CPWA, the closest US credential, costs USD 7,000 to 10,000, is delivered only in English and never touches the Mexican fideicomiso or the corridors of Latin American wealth. None tests what a high-net-worth client asks first: how to structure, protect and pass on.
Private Wealth Management Certification tests exactly that. Its body of knowledge runs from client profiling and public markets to multi-jurisdictional structuring, succession and family office governance, with the tax and regulatory frameworks of the jurisdictions through which the region's wealth moves. The certificate does not measure seniority. It measures whether the holder answered the question the client asks first — how to structure, protect and pass on — in front of an examiner who neither employs them nor prepared them.
- Three levels that track a real career: from bank adviser to private banker to family office executive.
- Regulation and tax across eight jurisdictions, from Mexico and the United States to Switzerland, Luxembourg, the British offshore islands and Singapore.
- The Mexican fideicomiso and the common-law trust treated as what they are: different vehicles with different uses, compared jurisdiction by jurisdiction.
- Alternatives and digital assets integrated into the advice, not presented as a product catalogue: private credit, private equity, real estate, hedge funds, evergreen funds and tokenisation.
- Spanish with technical terminology in English, the way the region's private bankers actually work.
- An exam independent of the program; items written at levels 1, 2 and 3 of Bloom's taxonomy, with the cut score set by the Angoff method.
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04 — OUTCOMESWhat it prepares for
- 01
Profile a high-net-worth client, draft the investment policy statement and determine the suitability of each product.
- 02
Build and rebalance a multi-asset portfolio using strategic and tactical allocation frameworks, and explain its performance through attribution.
- 03
Assess fixed income, equities, ETFs, derivatives and structured notes as tools to protect a private portfolio.
- 04
Analyse an opportunity in private credit, private equity, real estate or hedge funds: valuation, manager due diligence and fit within the portfolio.
- 05
Compare common-law trusts and Mexican fideicomisos, and choose the jurisdiction and structure that protect and transfer a family's wealth.
- 06
Design a tax-efficient investment strategy and comply with FATCA, CRS and anti-money-laundering obligations.
- 07
Structure the succession of a business-owning family and the governance of its family office: family council, investment committee and family charter.
- 08
Identify the geopolitical, cyber and financial-crime risks that threaten a family and design protection protocols.
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05 — INSTITUTIONSThe cut-off line
A private bank, a broker-dealer or a multi-family office hiring a wealth banker today relies on interviews, references and the Figure 3 regulatory certification. None of those tools shows that the candidate knows when a fideicomiso de control protects more than an irrevocable trust, how a structure is reported under CRS, or what to ask a private equity manager before committing a family's capital.
Requiring Private Wealth Management Certification sets a verifiable floor at each level. The certificate states which domains were tested, at what weight and at what level of mastery, and it is stated by a certifier that did not teach to the exam. For the head of private banking, compliance or human resources, that turns a hire made on trust into a decision made on evidence, and it allows Level I to be required of relationship managers and Level II or III of those who serve UHNW clients.
- A common standard for private banking, wealth banking, independent advisers and family offices across the region.
- Domains with published weights by level: the institution knows what was certified and to what depth.
- Verifiable progression: Level I for advisers and relationship managers; Levels II and III for private bankers and executives.
- Defined validity, to be confirmed in the call for candidates: the credential is not for life, as none issued by the Institute is.
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06 — PROFILEWho it is for
Who it is for
- Level I: advisers with one to three years' experience, AMIB Figure 3 holders and bank relationship managers.
- Level II: professionals with three to seven years who aspire to become private bankers or wealth advisers.
- Level III: family office executives, chief investment officers and heads of private banking with seven or more years.
- Tax specialists, trust and fiduciary lawyers and family governance consultants who want to certify an integrated view of wealth.
- Members of business-owning families and family councils who take part in decisions about their own wealth; the preparation program seats them in the same cohort as the bankers.
Who it is not for
- Anyone who only needs the regulatory certification to operate in the securities market; that is AMIB's Figure 3, with a different exam and different recognition.
- Anyone looking for training in commercial or consumer banking: the subject here is the wealth of high-net-worth individuals and families.
- Anyone expecting a purely quantitative credential; valuation is tested, but the core is integrated advisory.
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07 — KNOWLEDGEBody of knowledge
Eight domains across three levels. Weights are indicative: they aggregate the certification blueprint's domains by level and are confirmed in each level's call for candidates; topics come from the Private Wealth Management Institute executive program and from the blueprint.
01Industry, ethics, client profiling and financial planningLevel I · 30 %
- Origins and evolution of private and wealth banking; HNWI and UHNWI segmentation
- The wealth banker: business model, multidisciplinary team and value proposition
- Ethics, conflicts of interest, suitability and fiduciary duty
- Holistic profiling, KYC and the investment policy statement
- Behavioural finance applied to high-net-worth families
- Retirement and succession planning: assessing plans and building the successor team
- Wealth insurance: life cover for estate liquidity, PPLI, key person, luxury assets and captives
- Strategic philanthropy and impact investing
02Public markets and investment productsLevel I · 15 %
- Foreign exchange: hedging instruments and currency VaR of a portfolio
- Fixed income: Cetes, Bonos M, Udibonos, eurobonds and curve strategies
- Global equities: valuation, investment styles and access to international markets
- TRACs, ETFs and listed vehicles: FIBRAs, CKDs and CERPIs
- Derivatives and structured products for protecting private portfolios
- Reading macroeconomic indicators and their impact on markets
03Portfolio construction and strategic asset allocationLevel I · 15 % · Level II · 15 %
- Strategic and tactical allocation; the efficient frontier and Black-Litterman
- Active and passive management; selecting, monitoring and replacing managers
- Multi-manager portfolios and core-satellite structures
- Performance measurement, attribution and reporting to the family
- Consolidated risk control: VaR, stress testing and limit policies
- Trends: ESG, factor investing, direct indexing and artificial intelligence in management
04Tax, regulation and cross-border complianceLevel I · 35 % · Level II · 22 %
- The Mexican regime: securities law, investment advisers, CNBV and AMIB Figure 3
- Frameworks of the United States, Switzerland, Luxembourg, the British offshore islands and Singapore
- Tax-efficient investing: deferral, tax-loss harvesting, wrappers and treaties
- Tax transparency: FATCA, CRS and crypto-asset reporting
- Anti-money laundering: FATF standards, KYC and enhanced due diligence, PEPs and sanctions
- Offshore structures: legitimate use and signs of abuse
- Geopolitical, macroeconomic and liquidity risk in the private portfolio
05Private markets, alternatives and digital assetsLevel II · 16 % · Level III · 10 %
- The alternatives landscape and its role in a family office portfolio
- Private credit: strategies, vehicles and credit due diligence
- Private equity and venture capital: process, structuring, value creation and exit
- Direct and indirect real estate; FIBRAs versus REITs
- Hedge funds: strategies, performance metrics and due diligence
- Evergreen funds, feeders, secondaries and co-investment
- Valuation by asset class and operational due diligence of the manager
- Digital assets, tokenisation and custody; art and luxury assets
06Wealth structuring, trusts and multi-jurisdictional successionLevel II · 39 % · Level III · 27 %
- Common-law trusts and Mexican fideicomisos: concept, parties and asset protection
- Revocable and irrevocable trusts; dynasty and family trusts
- Jurisdictions: South Dakota and Delaware, Switzerland, the Cayman Islands, Panama, Singapore and Luxembourg
- International estate planning and tax-efficient wealth transfer
- The corridors of Latin American wealth: Mexico City, Miami, Geneva, Cayman and Singapore
- Fideicomisos de control and family governance vehicles
- Complex cross-border structures in case form
07Family offices, family governance and legacyLevel II · 8 % · Level III · 48 %
- Building and running a family office: single, multi and embedded
- Family council, investment committee and family charter
- Intergenerational succession and preparing the next generation
- Conflict management, continuity and contingency plans
- Structured philanthropy, impact investing and social legacy from the family office
- Advising UHNW clients: strategic leadership, communication and negotiation
08WealthTech, cybersecurity and technology strategyLevel I · 5 % · Level III · 15 %
- Multi-custodian aggregation and consolidated wealth reporting
- Artificial intelligence and personalised advice at scale
- Selecting and implementing platforms: integration, security and adoption
- Personal and family cybersecurity; privacy of wealth data
- Physical security, financial crime and risk transfer
- Technology strategy for the wealth management firm
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08 — TWO PRODUCTSPreparation program · Certification exam
Preparation program
Preparation program
Program delivered by Private Wealth Management Institute
The Private Wealth Management Executive Program is delivered by the Private Wealth Management Institute, the group's private banking and wealth institute, under its motto Learn. Apply. Profit. It brings those who manage wealth and those who own it into the same cohort. It covers the 16 modules underpinning the three exam levels and includes mock exams built to the same recipe as the exam. It is a separate product from the exam: contracted separately, with its own fee, and not a prerequisite for sitting it.
Private Wealth Management Executive Program
226 h113 two-hour sessions across 16 modules and an opening session: ethics in banking, private wealth management, strategic intelligence and negotiation, succession, strategic philanthropy, wealth insurance, tax-wise investing, public markets, private markets and alternatives, trading economics, strategic asset allocation, family offices and governance, WealthTech, wealth security, financial crime and compliance, and geopolitical risk. Hybrid format: Virtual Live plus in-person sessions in Mexico City and its metropolitan area.
Estructuras Fiduciarias para HNWIs & Family Offices
4 hPart 7 of Module IX, fiduciary structures, also delivered as a stand-alone executive session for a closed cohort: two in-person two-hour sessions in Mexico City on trusts, asset protection, jurisdictions and cases. The June 2026 edition was offered at USD 1,000 + TAX; future dates to be confirmed.
- All 16 modules and the opening session on the calendar, in two-hour sessions from 19:00 to 21:00 Mexico City time.
- Mock exams for each level, built to the exam recipe at Bloom levels 1, 2 and 3.
- Cases and workshops: hedging the currency exposure of a Mexican portfolio, valuing a private company, designing the wealth strategy of a family with global assets, and a negotiation simulation.
- A cohort that brings together bankers, advisers, family offices and business-owning families.
2025–2026 edition: October 2025 to September 2026, in two-hour sessions from 19:00 to 21:00 Mexico City time · hybrid Virtual Live and in-person format · the date of the next edition is to be confirmed.
Certification exam
Certification exam
Built, audited and administered by the RiskMathics Certificate Institute. It can be taken with or without the preparation program. Three sequential levels; the Level I bank currently holds 591 items across five subjects, calibrated to the level of AMIB Figure 3, and will be completed before a date is set.
If the candidate does not pass
The Certification Board is defining the failure and retake policy: how many attempts each window allows, the minimum wait between them, the fee for sitting the exam again and what happens to levels already passed. It is published here as soon as it is approved; in the meantime, the figures may be requested at growth@riskmathics.com. Exam governance →
Items are written at levels 1, 2 and 3 of Bloom's taxonomy: remember, understand and apply. Each form follows a fixed recipe of items per domain and per level. The Level II vignette cases, and the Level III extended cases and oral defence, assess level 3, apply, on real scenarios from the region. Bloom's Taxonomy →
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09 — MOCK EXAMSMock exams
The preparation program includes mock exams for each level. Each is assembled to the same recipe as the live exam: the same domains, the same weights and the same proportion of items per level of mastery, from remember to apply. The items are distinct from the certification bank; they measure the same thing without exposing it.
A Level I mock reproduces the format of 150 multiple-choice items in 3.5 hours. A Level II mock adds the vignette cases; a Level III mock, the extended cases. Results are returned by domain and by Bloom level, so the candidate knows what is missing and at which level.
- Level 1 · Remember: the parties to a trust, types of fideicomiso, FATCA and CRS obligations, classes of alternative assets.
- Level 2 · Understand: read a client profile, a yield curve, a private credit fund memorandum or a family charter.
- Level 3 · Apply: choose the structure and jurisdiction for a family, design an asset allocation, or decide when faced with a money-laundering red flag.
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10 — PATHLearning path
- Phase 1
Foundations of wealth bankingOpening session and modules I–III · 14 sessions · 28 h
Ethics in banking; private wealth management in four parts, from client segmentation to private banking and family office strategies; strategic intelligence, leadership and negotiation. The frame of reference for everything that follows.
- Phase 2
Planning, protection and taxModules IV–VII · 11 sessions · 22 h
Retirement and succession planning, strategic philanthropy, wealth insurance strategies and tax-wise investing: how wealth is protected, deferred and passed on within the rules of each jurisdiction.
- Phase 3
Public and private marketsModules VIII–IX · 54 sessions · 108 h
Foreign exchange, fixed income, global equities, ETFs, derivatives and structured products; then the private markets: private credit, digital assets, modelling and valuation, private equity and venture capital, evergreen funds, fiduciary structures, real estate, hedge funds, alternatives 360, and art and luxury.
- Phase 4
Macro, portfolio, family office and protectionModules X–XVI · 34 sessions · 68 h
Trading economics, strategic asset allocation and advanced portfolio management, family offices and governance, WealthTech, cyber and physical security, financial crime and compliance. It closes with geopolitical risk: expropriation, asset freezes and extreme tax changes, and how a family's wealth is shielded against them.
- Phase 5
Mock exams and certification by levelTo be confirmed
Mock exams for each level at the close of the program. Level I opens once the item bank covers all nine domains; Levels II and III are scheduled afterwards, with vignette cases, extended cases and an oral defence.
Investment
11Program and exam, priced separately
Program and exam are two products with two fees; neither includes the other. Fees are stated in US dollars plus applicable tax; how the exam fee applies to each level is confirmed in the call for candidates.
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12 — FAQFrequently asked questions
When does the first exam open?
The date is to be confirmed. The Level I bank holds 591 items across five subjects, calibrated to the level of AMIB Figure 3, covering part of the nine domains; ethics, regulation, compliance, planning and technology are being completed before a date is set. Levels II and III are scheduled afterwards. Dates are published in the call for candidates.
Does it replace the AMIB Figure 3 certification?
No. Private Wealth Management Certification is a professional certification with no regulatory recognition. Figure 3 certifies the minimum that regulation requires to operate in the securities market; this certification certifies integrated wealth advisory, from multi-jurisdictional structuring to family office governance. They are complementary: Level I is designed, among others, for Figure 3 holders.
Can the exam be taken without the program?
Yes. The exam is contracted separately and does not require the preparation program. The program covers the 16 modules of the syllabus and includes mock exams; candidates who already command the material may register directly for the exam at the level that applies to them.
What distinguishes the three levels?
Level I certifies foundations in 150 multiple-choice items: markets and products, portfolio construction, regulatory frameworks, industry and ethics, client profiling, tax fundamentals, risk and compliance, financial planning and technology. Level II certifies applied advisory in 120 items and two cases: cross-border structuring, trusts, tax planning, succession, alternatives, digital assets and compliance. Level III certifies wealth architecture for UHNW clients and family offices through three extended cases, an oral defence and an applied paper.
In which language are the program and the exam delivered?
In Spanish, with technical terminology in English where it is the industry standard: trust, asset allocation, due diligence, family office. One program module, retirement and succession planning, is delivered in English because it follows an international methodology. Certification names remain in English.
What is the role of the Private Wealth Management Institute?
It delivers the preparation program. It is the group's institute dedicated to private banking and wealth, under the motto Learn. Apply. Profit., and its cohorts bring together bankers, advisers, family offices and business-owning families. The RiskMathics Certificate Institute builds, audits and administers the exam; the separation between the institute that prepares and the one that certifies is deliberate.
Private Wealth Management Certification
Wealth is not inherited. It is structured, protected and passed on.