London has attracted by far the largest volumes of financial services foreign direct investment (FDI) in the 12 months to the end of September 2014. An estimated total of more than $1.3bn flew into the British hub over that period, according to data provider fDi Intelligence. Investments were made through 44 projects with an average size of about $30m, spent typically to open new foreign bank branches or investment firms’ distribution offices. This represents an improvement from a year earlier, both in terms of volumes and number of deals.
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In a sign that the Irish economy is fast recovering, Dublin is the second scoring international financial centre (IFC) in the list, with about $400m of capital expenditure pouring into its financial sector.
Right on its heels is Birmingham, which would not typically be labelled as an IFC but where the local financial sector attracted more than $300m in foreign investment though just three projects. The largest single investment in Birmingham comes from Germany, where Deutsche Bank has spent an estimated $250m on an expansion project there.
Looking at outward investment, London once again comes on top. As of September 2014, it had generated about $2.2bn of FDI into other financial centres across the world. Its leadership, however, is not as distinct as it is in the inward tables. Other western European hubs originated considerable volumes of investments. Frankfurt, the second on the list, saw about $1.4bn leaving its borders to international locations; while the figure for Paris, in third place, is a generous $1.1bn. The French capital did even better a year earlier, when it topped the outward financial services FDI ranking thanks to an estimated $2.3bn capital expenditure.
