Chris Skinner's blog

Shaping the future of finance

Where’s the best place to head office the bank?

Chris Skinner Author Avatar
by

"Where's the best place to head office the bank?" is a question asked regularly by folks like HSBC, and the answer may be quite surprising.

Obviously, key contenders would be London, Paris, Frankfurt, New York,
Chicago, Sydney, Tokyo, Hong Kong, Singapore ... in fact, any of these
could be appropriate.  Most banks decide based upon where their roots
were and what sort of specialisation they have, such as whether they
are a local retail player or a derivatives focused investment bank.  In
other words, you locate based upon history, product, service, access to
resources and skills and so forth.

But if you were moving Head Office as a global bank, without any loyalty to any location today, where would you locate?

Well, now there is an answer. 

The Heritage Foundation's Distribution of Economic Freedom.

The 2008 list has just come out and it's got some surprising details and views.

Before giving you the results however, it's worth understanding how
they calculate this list.  The Heritage Foundation assessed 162
countries  and reviewed ten areas, such as their freedom of trade,
freedom of business, freedom of investment, freedom from corruption,
size of Government and respect for property rights.  Countries are then
graded with a score between 0 and 100 to produce a simple, unbiased
overall score for each country.

So, who do you think would be the winner?

USA?  Nope, they're fifth.

The UK?  Nope, tenth.

Japan?  Seventeeth.

Iraq?  Urrmmm ... they didn't grade that one.

First
for freedom and the best place to locate your bank would be ... Hong
Kong.  Now, isn't that lucky for HSBC if they wanted to move?

Here's the Top 10:

  1. Hong Kong
  2. Singapore
  3. Ireland
  4. Australia
  5. United States
  6. New Zealand
  7. Canada
  8. Chile
  9. Switzerland
  10. United Kingdom

Visit  the Countries or have a look at the World Economic Freedom Map.

What's interesting is that when you look at the analysis of the Top 10
based upon the ten criteria used: America is the worst for corruption,
Chile the worst for monetary freedom, Australia the worst for fiscal
freedom, and the UK is the worst for freedom of labour and our size of
Government.

Don't we just know it?

UncategorizedCategories
Chris Skinner Author Avatar

Chris M Skinner

Chris Skinner is best known as an independent commentator on the financial markets through his blog, TheFinanser.com, as author of the bestselling book Digital Bank, and Chair of the European networking forum the Financial Services Club. He has been voted one of the most influential people in banking by The Financial Brand (as well as one of the best blogs), a FinTech Titan (Next Bank), one of the Fintech Leaders you need to follow (City AM, Deluxe and Jax Finance), as well as one of the Top 40 most influential people in financial technology by the Wall Street Journal's Financial News. To learn more click here...

Intelligent Money - Chris Skinner Keynote @ Pay 360 conference 2024

What is the future?

Learn more

Learn more about Chris

About Chris Skinner

The Past, Present And Future Of Banking, Finance And Technology

Fintech expert Chris Skinner: countries need digital transformation to remain competitive

Join me on Linkedin

Follow Me on X!

Hire Chris Skinner for dinners, workshops and more

Learn directly from from one of the most influential people in technology, gain insights from the world's most innovative companies, and build a global network.

Chris’s latest book

Chris Skinner’s ‘Digital For Good’ Book Launch Event – CFTE

Top 50 Global Thought Leaders and Influencers on FinTech 2023

Chris Skinner
Commentator, CEO of The Finanser and best-selling author at The Finanser

Thinkers360 Thought Leader

Contact Me

Global Awards

Lifetime Achievement Award

Global 100 - 2024 Winner

Chris Skinner - Financial Markets Advisor of the Year - The Finanser - UK 2023

Best Financial Markets Advisor of the Year 2023

30 Best Regtech Blogs and Websites 2023

Kids creating the future bank | TEDxAthens

Captain Cake and the Candy Crew

Captain Cake Winner of a Golden Mom’s Choice Award

TWO-TIME WINNER OF A MOM’S CHOICE GOLD AWARD!

Alex at the Financial Services

Gaping Void's Hugh MacLeod worked with the Finanser