Since opening its doors late last year, JPMorgan Chase has hosted its share of big names at its new 270 Park Avenue skyscraper, and Wednesday was no exception.
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The firm invited sports superstars, including NBA Hall of Famer Dwyane Wade, Super Bowl champion Tom Brady, World Cup winner Megan Rapinoe, and a handful of other athletes to announce a new initiative aimed at an audience they’re familiar with: athletes navigating wealth.
Careers in sports can be short, earnings can spike early, and many athletes lack financial education before going pro. The new “Athlete Council,” led by Wade, will help the bank craft a program designed to serve athletes from college through to retirement, JPMorgan said in a release.
Young athletes present a big opportunity for the firm. Between the popularity of live events, short-form content, and betting, many consider sports the next frontier in entertainment.
Sitting on a panel alongside the star athletes, Kristin Lemkau, the bank’s CEO of wealth management, called young athletes an “unoccupied space” for financial advising.
“We really, really need the advice of the athletes to build something authentic. We are designing this by athletes, for athletes. We had a closed-door session where we heard from all of these incredible athletes what it is that they think people need, ” she said.
JPMorgan isn’t alone in targeting athletes as clients. Morgan Stanley, Goldman Sachs, and Merrill Lynch have built dedicated sports and entertainment businesses. Across the country, wealth managers have ramped up efforts to court athletes as early as college, especially after the NCAA began allowing them to monetize their name, image, and likeness in 2021.
The athletes on JPMorgan’s council range from a Peloton instructor to a football rusher, and Rapinoe said on Wednesday that there’s value in having diverse perspectives and, in turn, representing diverse needs among young people. That diversity could help JPMorgan reach a wider group of potential clients.
Ally Love, a Peloton instructor, said she barely knew what a financial advisor was when she started earning money. Brady said that many young athletes don’t have people in their network who can guide their financial decision-making.
“How can someone have the credibility and the trust, and develop that over a period of time, so that people can go to a particular place for the right information, so they don’t have to learn just by losing?” he said.
