Forget zero fees and robots: One broker doubles down on humans

As the global brokerage industry shifts to zero fees for trading and robots to give advice, one company in Singapore is deciding to buck the trend.

UOB-Kay Hian Holdings  has taken on a large group of securities trading representatives, known as remisiers, from a brokerage arm of the country’s largest bank. It’s essentially a bet customers will still pay extra to be hand-held in their trades.

“There is a lot of digitisation, but the human touch is still very important,” Esmond Choo, senior executive director at UOB-Kay Hian, said in an interview. People will be willing to pay “a few basis points”