Bermuda drops in financial centre rankings

Scott Neil, Assistant Business Editor

Published Mar 28, 2018 at 8:00 am (Updated Mar 27, 2018 at 8:37 pm)

Change at the top: Bermuda is now the second highest ranked financial centre in the Latin America and Caribbean region, having been overtaken by Cayman Islands in the latest Global Financial Centres Index

Bermuda has fallen seven places in the world’s top financial centres rankings and been leapfrogged by Cayman Islands, according to a report published by the City of London.

The 23rd Global Financial Centres Index which is compiled by the Z/Yen Group and updated every six months, ranked Bermuda 36th out of 96 centres. The list features a mixture of countries, jurisdictions and individual cities.

London, New York and Hong Kong remain the top three financial centres in the rankings, while Cayman Islands, at 22, is now the highest placed centre in the Latin America and Caribbean region, replacing Bermuda at the top of the pile. The report revealed that all financial centres in the region ended with lower GFCI ratings, except for Cayman Islands.

An unnamed investment fund director based in Miami is quoted in the report as saying: “The Caribbean is not a great place to be at the moment. Hurricanes and now a loss of confidence.”

Bermuda is placed between Munich and Bangkok in the overall ratings, and is ahead of many other offshore centres, including Jersey, Guernsey, Bahamas, Isle of Man and the British Virgin Islands.

The ratings are calculated taking into account 103 instrumental factors measured by a variety of international bodies, such as the ICT Development Index, and Telecommunication Infrastructure Index, and the Government Effectiveness rating supplied by the World Bank.

In addition, thousands of financial centre assessments are factored in to the ratings, based on continuously running online questionnaire.

The report noted an overall increase in confidence for the leading centres, and stated: “Signs of a bias towards stronger and more established centres are evident with the top 25 centres all rising in the ratings. Ratings fell for all of the lowest 50 centres.”

View the report at http://goo.gl/u8fFGe ,/i>

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