New York and other North America financial centers fared well in a recent ranking of global hubs although the recent political circus saw the Big Apple lose some of its shine.

One of the dangers of the controversies around Brexit and the current president of the United States is that one suspects these issues dominate airwaves so much that certain stark facts of reality don’t intrude as much as they probably should.

There are frequent reports showing that this or that city/country is the most desirable or expensive, and another ranking comes along this week from Z/Yen, a London-based think tank. In its Global Financial Centres Index 21 report (48 pages), based on 24 months of responses up to December last year, much play in the press release is given to the fact that both London and New York have seen their ranking scores drop heavily from the previous survey, with the UK’s vote to quit the European Union and election of Donald J Trump to the US presidency cited as reasons for these falls. 

But what is perhaps noticeable if one examines the data is that not a single eurozone member country’s big city stands in the top 10, and furthermore, London and New York are still first and second, respectively, with scores of 782 and 780. In third place - unchanged from the previous ranking but with a higher score - is Singapore, followed by Hong Kong and Tokyo. Next in line are San Francisco, Chicago, Sydney, Boston, Toronto. Zurich is at 11th, while Luxembourg is the only eurozone member to be in the top 20. Frankfurt is at 23rd spot and Paris at 29th. It might seem, therefore, that any talk of London losing its pre-eminence as a financial center to the continent is premature.

The index was compiled using 101 quantitative factors, gleaned from organizations such as the World Bank, OECD and Economist Intelligence Unit. They are mixed with assessments to a questionnaire (there were a total of 3,008 responses.) The survey, published in conjunction with the China Development Institute, rates 88 financial centers. The quantitative factors, for example, look at areas of competitiveness: business environment; human capital, infrastructure, sector development and reputation. (There are sub-groups under these various categories.)

The report found that the gap between third place Singapore and second place New York continues to close. Singapore rose by eight points and is now only 20 points behind New York having been 42 points behind in the GFCI 20 report. This is an interesting finding - as reported by the Economist Intelligence Unit Recently, Singapore remains the world’s costliest city in which to live. 

There is a lot of volatility in Western European financial centers. Of the 29 Global Financial Centre Index centres in the region, 16 fell and 12 rose. Geneva recovered some of the ground it lost in GFCI 20. Ratings for Amsterdam, Vienna and Gibraltar fell significantly, the report said.  

Financial centers in the Middle East and Africa did well in GFCI 21. Apart from a very small decline by Dubai, the other main hubs improved in the ratings. There were strong rises for Abu Dhabi and Tel Aviv. Latin American centres continue to struggle. Sao Paulo, Rio de Janeiro and Panama all fell significantly. Buenos Aires and Santiago remain associate centers having failed to accumulate a sufficient number of assessments to enter the main index.

Offshore center had mixed results. The British Crown Dependencies remained stable, whilst Caribbean centers had mixed fortunes with the Cayman Islands and the British Virgin Islands falling, but Bermuda and the Bahamas rose slightly.

Los Angeles moved up 20 points into the top 20 global centers. In Canada, Toronto, Montreal and Vancouver all performed well in GFCI 21. Financial professionals continue to favor safety and stability in their choices of location.