British ‘passporting’ loss may topple London, says PwC

Consulting group PwC has said Britain’s vote to leave the EU could create more opportunities for Dublin as a leading financial services centre.

PwC has developed a ‘financial attractiveness index’ which shows that Dublin currently ranks second behind London as the most attractive of European financial services centres. Luxembourg, Paris and Vienna rank third, fourth and fifth respectively.

PwC’s analysis shows that, everything else remaining equal, the loss of passporting in Britain after Brexit could see London lose its place as the EU’s strongest financial centre with Dublin rising to the top spot in the league. Passporting gives financial institutions in Britain unfettered access to the rest of the EU’s single market.

“At present, it appears that the only way for London to continue to benefit from passporting would be for the UK to join the European Economic Area (EEA) when it leaves the EU,” PwC says, adding that this could be difficult to achieve politically.

“While Ireland and Dublin offers certainty on access to the single market and EU passporting, other factors such as an English-speaking, flexible and highly-skilled workforce, a pro-business environment and a strong and stable legal system are also positives,” said PwC Ireland’s head of financial services Damian Neylin. He added that the company was already seeing some British financial services organisations making enquiries about relocating to Ireland.