Julius Baer Is a Conservative Swiss Money Manager . . .

Guess How It Approaches the Art Market?

Bloomberg has a nice profile of Raymond Baer and his firm’s art program. They buy contemporary Swiss Art for small prices–under $10,000–and refuse to treat art as an asset class for their clients:

For Baer, the bank’s art collection is a “passion,” not an investment, and he wants to keep it that way. Unlike its competitors Deutsche Bank AG and UBS AG, Julius Baer has no art- investing department in its wealth-management division.

“We have a business decision not to be art advisers and we also don’t lend money against art,” Baer says. “Art is art, and the art of money management is something else.”

Julius Baer Invests in Art, From Spray Squiggle to Crystal Ball (Bloomberg)