Private Banking

A term that refers to a higher level of financial services afforded to a bank's wealthiest clients. Offshore banking services are most commonly handled by private banks that cater solely to private banking clientele or by the private banking departments of commercial banks.

Private banking activities are conducted through relationship managers and marketing officers who have access to a team of specialists around the world in order to provide personal money management, financial advice, and investment services to their high net worth clients. The private banking department of a commercial bank has been described as functioning as a bank within a bank, maintaining its own separate books and records, and subject to separate operating procedures.

Private bankers are in a unique position of having knowledge and understanding of their client's personal and business backgrounds, sources of wealth, and uses of private banking accounts.