The Estonian capital has fallen from the 44th position to 79th in the Global Financial Centres Index.
Since 2007, Z/Yen Group, a London-based commercial think-tank, and the Shenzhen-based China Development Institute, have published the Global Financial Centres Index. It’s a study of the competitiveness of financial centres based on several assessments from an online questionnaire. Additionally, over 100 indices from organisations, such as the World Bank, the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development, and the Economist Intelligence Unit are used to compile the ranking.
The ranking is an aggregate of indices from five key areas: “business environment”, “financial sector development”, “infrastructure factors”, “human capital”, “reputation and general factors”.
According to the latest ranking, London is still holding the top spot as the world’s leading financial centre, narrowly beating New York. The two global alpha cities are followed by Hong Kong, Singapore and Tokyo in the top five.
Although it may come as a surprise that Tallinn is in the global financial centres top 100 at all, the Estonian capital has lost much ground compared with the previous index, falling by 35 places to the 79th position. Tallinn is still ahead of Moscow (83), the capital of Russia; Helsinki (85), the Finnish capital; and Riga (87), the Latvian capital. However, Stockholm, the Swedish capital, is at 42.
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Cover: A business district in Tallinn city centre (the image is illustrative).