Singapore Jumps to the 3rd Place in Global Financial Ranking, Ousting Hong Kong Down to the 4th

In the latest Global Financial Centres Index, Singapore jumps up to the third place after New York and London, overtaking Hong Kong that falls to the fourth place.

We’ve been hearing several international events hosted and participated by Asia’s Lion city of Singapore, including the upcoming F1 2022 Grand Prix. As a result, the unstoppable country has successfully climbed up from the sixth to the third place of the 32nd edition Global Financial Centres Index, a semi-annual report conducted by the China Development Institute in Shenzhen and the London think tank Z/Yen Partners. The first and second place belong to New York and London, respectively.

Hong Kong is pulled down to the fourth place, potentially because of the country’s ongoing travel restrictions in dealing with Covid-19. The ‘zero Covid‘ policy required all travellers to be in a 21-day quarantine upon arrival, which has been a burden for most business travellers for more than two years. This led to events that were set to be arranged in Hong Kong to be canceled, like the Standard Chartered Hong Kong Marathon and the World Dragon Boat Racing Championship that has been relocated to Thailand instead.

On the other hand, Singapore just announced the lifting of the indoor mask mandate in August, while also implementing rules to facilitate travellers who have not yet received their full vaccination. The city is now moving closer to lift one last Covid-19 measure, which may unsurprisingly accelerate the local economy even more.

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