Private Wealth Management The full picture. Not just the portfolio.
Significant wealth creates decisions that can’t be made in isolation. How you invest affects your taxes. How you own assets affects your estate. A business sale can change your income and your family’s responsibilities overnight. ASYMMETRY® Wealth Strategy brings those decisions into one plan, and Christi Shell leads it.
Investment management is necessary.It’s not sufficient.
What a first review can find.
- PortfolioManaged, with exits set in advanceIn place
- TrustsLast read eight years agoGap
- TitlingTwo accounts don’t match the estate planGap
- BeneficiariesOut of date on a retirement accountGap
- InsuranceBought for needs that have changedGap
- SuccessionNo written plan for the businessGap
Investment management covers one line. The other five are where the costly mistakes sit.
The costly mistakes rarely sit in the portfolio.
Titling that doesn’t match the estate plan. Trusts no one has read in years. Insurance bought for a different life. A business with no succession plan. These gaps tend to surface at the worst time, when they’re hardest to fix.
The goal is a financial life that works as one thing, not a set of separate accounts and separate advice.
Significant wealth asks different questions.
The question isn’t which stock to own. It’s these.
- How much capital should remain exposed to market risk?
- How much liquidity do we actually need?
- Where are we unintentionally concentrated?
- Should I sell, hedge, borrow against, or keep this position?
- What should be gifted now rather than later?
- What happens to my spouse if I’m not here?
- What does the estate plan actually do if I die tomorrow?
- How much is enough, and what is this money ultimately for?
Those aren’t portfolio questions. They’re wealth questions. We answer both.
We start with your entire balance sheet.
Investments, the business, real estate, retirement accounts, trusts, entities, debts, insurance and cash flows, and the professionals already in place. Then every open decision gets an owner and a date.
A family decision map.
| Area | The decision | Who carries it out | When |
|---|---|---|---|
| Investments | How much risk, in what, with which exits. | Mike Shell. | Ongoing, reviewed with you. |
| Liquidity | What stays in cash, and what can be borrowed against. | Christi and Mike, with your banker. | The next 12 months. |
| Tax | Which gains, losses and gifts, and in which year. | Your CPA, coordinated by Christi. | Before year-end, and before any sale. |
| Estate | Who receives what, how it’s titled, and who decides. | Your attorney, coordinated by Christi. | Each year, and at every life change. |
| Business | Succession, a sale, the terms. | You and your deal advisers, with us. | Before the terms are set. |
| Family | What the next generation knows, and when it receives it. | You, with Christi. | As the family changes. |
One family. Several time horizons.
The same capital has to meet next year’s tax bill, a transition a decade away and a transfer that outlasts everyone in the room. Each is an obligation with its own timing.
Liquidity. Spending, taxes coming due, a purchase, a capital call. Money that can’t be in a drawdown when it’s needed.
Transition. A business sale, the end of a career, retirement income starting, a concentrated position unwound.
Transfer. Estate, trusts, giving, and preparing the next generation to receive capital.
The plan decides what each horizon needs before the portfolio decides how much risk it can take.
The rest of the balance sheet.
Estate and gift planning
Trusts, gifts and estate documents, coordinated with your attorney so the plan matches your life now.
Titling and beneficiaries
Who owns what, how it’s titled and who is named affects liability exposure and what your heirs receive.
Asset protection
Structures that seek to shield what you’ve built from lawsuits and creditors, set up with your attorney.
Tax-aware decisions
Which gains to take and when, losses harvested, appreciated assets given, coordinated with your CPA before year-end.
Retirement income
Turning the portfolio into income: which accounts to draw from first, Social Security timing and required distributions.
Credit and liquidity
Cash and borrowing lined up for what’s coming, so you aren’t forced to sell at a bad time.
Insurance
Coverage reviewed against what the family needs now, not what it needed when the policy was bought.
Business exit and succession
The decisions before a sale, the terms at closing and the first year after, with your deal advisers.
Giving and the next generation
Donor-advised funds, charitable trusts, family governance and preparing heirs to receive capital.
Coordinated specialists. Accountable follow-through.
Who decides what.
- What it owns, and why
- How much risk it takes
- Exits, sizing and hedges
- Your account at Goldman Sachs
- Cash flow and income
- Tax timing, with your CPA
- Estate and trusts, with your attorney
- The business and the family
- CPAPrepares the returns.
- AttorneyDrafts the documents.
- TrusteeAdministers the trust.
- BankerProvides the lending.
- InsuranceIssues the policies.
Christi works directly with you and the professionals you trust, turning the big questions into a sequence of decisions: what’s already handled, what’s exposed, who needs to act and what has to happen first. The result should be less uncertainty about the decisions, not a thicker binder. If you don’t have a CPA, attorney or trustee, we’ll introduce you to ours.
What every family gets.
- A one-page family balance sheet.Everything you own and owe, on one page.
- A written list of open decisions.Each with an owner and a date.
- A regular check of titling and beneficiaries.So the accounts match the plan.
- Your CPA and attorney on the same plan.So everyone works from the same picture.
The portfolio and the plan have to agree.
Before a business sale, we can’t set how much risk the portfolio takes without knowing when the estimated taxes are due, which gifts are planned, what’s held back in escrow and what the family needs in cash. Mike and Christi work that out together, before the money is invested.
- 01Taxes dueWhen, and how much.
- 02Gifts plannedTo family, to trusts, to charity.
- 03Escrow and earnoutWhat isn’t paid at closing.
- 04Cash the family needsSpending, and the unexpected.
- 05The risk budgetWhat’s left can be invested, and how much it can lose.
Taxes shape the mandate. The mandate shapes the estate and cash decisions.
Christi Shell leads ASYMMETRY® Wealth Strategy.
As Director of Private Wealth Strategy, Christi works with your CPA, attorney and trustee so the decisions around your capital fit together. Mike Shell manages the portfolio. You work with both.
Her job is to see what specialists see separately.
Questions about wealth strategy.
What is ASYMMETRY® Wealth Strategy?
It’s how Shell Capital Management coordinates the rest of a family’s balance sheet: estate, tax, insurance, retirement income, succession and giving. Christi Shell leads it, working with the family’s CPA, attorney and trustee, alongside the portfolio Mike Shell manages.
Do I keep my CPA and attorney?
Yes. Your attorney drafts and your CPA files. Christi keeps them working from the same picture. If you don’t have one, we can introduce you to ours.
How is this different from a family office?
A family office adds reporting, bill pay and entity accounting. Our Family Office service coordinates those through specialist firms we select and oversee.
Do I need to use you for the investments too?
The two are built to work together, because the plan and the portfolio have to agree. What makes sense for your situation is part of the first conversation.
Who is it for?
Investors and families with $5 million or more, especially those with a business, trusts or the proceeds of a recent sale.
Bring us the whole picture.
Tell us what changed, what you’re deciding, and who is already on your team.
If you write, I’ll read it myself.
Mike Shell, Founder & Chief Investment Officer
Related: Family Office, Christi Shell, How We Manage Risk and Selling a Business.