Number of area millionaires grows 26% - Dallas Business Journal:

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The region finished 2007 with 84,778 households with more than $1 million available to invest -- up 22% from 2006's totalo of 69,710 million-dollar according to data behind a new studyby . Millionaires households grew ata 6% pace globally, accordinyg to the investment annual World Wealth Report. The report, by Merrill Lyncy and outsourcingfirm Capgemini, found 10.1 million millionaires In North Texas, the proliferation of entrepreneurs and executivesa deserve credit for that sustained said Michael Garcia, a vice president and wealth managerr at Merrill Lynch's global wealth management Dallas is very conveniently positioned in the center of the which makes it a good spot for nationaol corporations and divisions of large companies to put their Garcia said.
That meane that top executives, whose contracts include potentially lucrativestock options, oftenb make the region their home as they climb the corporated ladder and grow theirf own fortune. Liquidating stock options makex those execsinto millionaires, and their entrepreneurt counterparts make that leap by sellingf the companies they founded. In both publif and private ranks, Dallas-Fort Wortnh landed a large amount of liquidity events last saidMark Casey, Texas regional directoer of Merrill's private banking and investment group. That unit handlese households with morethan $10 million availablde to invest.
Casey set up the privatde banking and investment group in Texasa for Merrillin 2005, when D-FW had about 67,000 millionair households. "There were so many liquidity events last year wheree these entrepreneurs got hundreds of millions of Casey said. And that helped his unit boosrt its assets under management and the numbee of clientson board. In additiohn to executives benefitingfrom 2007's stock market increases or entrepreneurs cashing in on the businesses they've households and communities in North Texas have also benefitedf from the exploration of the Barnett Shale'ss natural gas.
"There is a lot of new wealtg being generated inFort D/FW airport area," Garcia said. A Marcg 2008 study by economists at the figuree that the Barnett Shalreadded $8.2 billion annually in new economifc input to the region. In all those instances, thesse people see their wealth on pape before itbecomes cash. Once they have the cash, the newlyg wealthy have some adjustingto do. "Whenj the paper wealth turns intoreal wealth, they're usually very very cognizant that their situationm has changed," Garcia said. Instead of investing to make more money, the extremelyu wealthy focus on preservinh wealth andmanaging risk.
That was well demonstratesd last year in wealthy investors reactions to the slowing national econom y and the credit crisis in latesummer 2007. "People'a mindsets almost immediately startedto change," Garciaw said. "A lot of their investment dollars shifted from equities to bond andsafer environments." Casey's ultra-wealthy as a group stepped away from risk by rebalancingt away from real estate investments and private equity and hedge and parking more capital in cash and cash-likee investments.
The move away from real estate is part of reapinh some return in a field that had grown quicklgy in the middle of the The shift away from hedge funds and private equithy investments came as those investments started returning more pedestrianh ratesof return. "They really started out with big numberin 2000, 2001 and 2002," Casey said. "Bu t as the popularity of the funds grew, they becam long in the tooth." Many wealthy investors are sitting onthe sidelines, usinhg money market accounts and treasuru notes to earn some safe returna on their funds while they wait for the marketzs to improve.
Others are showing interest in "green investing" -- puttinf money behind clean energy or new technologg that promisesmore efficiency, and environmentally friendly ways of doing things, Casey Garcia says people also are making "investments of passion," by collecting art, luxur y automobiles, wines or coins. That beinb said, much money remains on the sidelines. "Thde amount of cash in money market accounts ishuge -- in the trillions," Caseyg said.