Helping women manage their finances

Citigold’s luncheon presentation on women and finance and women in finance  held at Crabtree’s Kittle House in Mount Kisco on Wednesday, April 26, offered a tantalizing contradiction: 

On the one hand, women do not, generally speaking, do as well financially as men. Women earn .83 cents to every $1 men earn. For every 100 men promoted from entry level to manager, only 87 women are promoted and only 82 women of color the so-called “broken rung” of the corporate ladder phenomenon. 

As women climb that corporate ladder, the situation only becomes more daunting. In 2020, women in C suites earned only .75 cents for every $1 their male counterparts earned. And women leaders are “significantly more likely” than their male counterparts to leave their jobs in search of a more flexible, equitable, inclusive work environment, according to Citi’s white paper, “Financial Wellness for Women: Key Considerations and Challenges, which as distributed as part of the event. 

Women need that flexible environment, as they are still more apt to be doing most if not all of the housework and caregiving. Entry-level women do about twice as much as men, while women leaders do nearly four times as much. 

Nor is the retirement picture much better: Women’s retirement estimations are about 40% lower than men’s. They contribute 22% less to their retirement plans. And thus they have 30% less in their 401(k) plans. 

And yet, for all this, women control an estimated $22 trillion in wealth ”“ more than half of the personal wealth in the United States. (They are 50.5% of the nation’s population.) By 2030, women are expected to control two-thirds of that wealth through earnings and inheritance. (Women now dominate colleges and professional schools. And they also live five years longer than men.) 

All the more reason for the kind of conversation that Citigold which offers wealth management that embraces banking, investing and lifestyle hosted between Kristen Bitterly, head of North American Investments at Citi Global Wealth Management, who provided much of the above data; and Anita Knotts, a former wealth adviser and CEO of Lotus Women’s Institute. (Debjani Majumdar — head of digital, segments and value proposition for U.S. Consumer Wealth Management at Citi served as emcee.) 

Over a three-course lunch of gazpacho/house salad, Scottish salmon and dessert bites, Bitterly and Knotts engaged in a dialogue before an audience of 46, 71% of whom were Citigold clients or prospective clients, and 29% of whom were wealth advisers. Afterward, we had an opportunity to talk with Bitterly and Judi Leahy, senior wealth adviser with Citi Personal Wealth Management. Here are a few takeaways from the afternoon: 

Women are indeed different than men Or at least women investors are. They are more goal-oriented and conservative, Bitterly said. They tend to hold more money in cash. So it’s especially important for women to “make sure your cash is working for you,” she added, distinguishing between operating cash (which you need for living expenses) and investment cash (which you want to have working for you long-term). Women are also what she called “humble investors.” Indeed any in the mostly female audience prefaced their questions or remarks by saying they didn’t know a lot about money. They then launched into complex questions about derivatives, U.S. Treasury bills and the VIX (the Chicago Board Options Exchange Volatility Index). 

Perhaps women advisers are different, too. Bitterly and Knotts began their conversation by saying that though they had just met, they were already fast friends, bonding over not only professional interests but a discussion of their children. It was a reminder that investing is about a personal relationship between adviser and client with a holistic understanding of who the client is, including the individual’s background. As Leahy would tell us in the follow-up interview:  “How you grew up with money determines what your relationship with money will be.”

You don’t have to be a math whiz to be in finance or understand it. “I’ve heard women say, ”I don’t know how to sell. I’m not good at math, Knotts said. But while she has a Bachelor of Science degree in economics from the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign and an MBA in finance from DePaul University, Leahy has a B.S. in geology from Stony Brook University, and Bitterly graduated summa cum laude from the University of Notre Dame with a Bachelor of Arts degree in Spanish language and literature as well as economics.  

Diversity is where the corporate world’s at Knotts, who immigrated to the United States from India when she was 4, said she founded Lotus during the pandemic to advance women and women of color in wealth management, because “I wanted to give voice to the voiceless. It’s what Citi has sought to do for three years by teaming with the Music Forward Foundation on the LGBTQ+ Emerging Artist Award, which provides 15 diverse musicians with $10,000 each to help them on their creative journeys. The event featured a jazzy performance by Brooklyn singer-songwriter Yancyabril, who appeared via Citi’s collaboration with Music Forward. 

Young people just have a different attitude toward work In response to a question from an audience member criticizing the work ethic of the younger generation, Knotts observed that young workers’ identities are not necessarily tied up with their jobs. Compromise, she said, is key to a more productive relationship with them, because they, after all, are going to be the leaders of tomorrow. And indeed, according to Citi’s “Financial Wellness for Women” White paper, more than two-thirds of women under age 30 want to be senior leaders. 

Even if you’re not an investor, you need a financial plan Begin, Leahy said, with a budget based on your after-tax income. Understand the difference, Bitterly added, between good debt (a mortgage, whose interest you can subtract from your taxable income) and bad debt (a credit card, whose statement balance you should pay off every month to avoid exorbitant interest charges).  

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