|
On an upward curve: Malta's financial sector
|
|
|
|
Posted by Cfo World News
|
|
jeudi, 03 juin 2010 |
 The European Union’s smallest state has proved to be one of its most resilient, with the economy holding up relatively well and the financial services sector booming. Michael Imeson, who has visited Malta several times in the past year, explains what makes the country tick
While many of the world’s leading financial centres have suffered because of the financial crisis, a few smaller jurisdictions have been ticking along quite nicely, thank you. Malta is one of them.
It may be the European Union’s smallest state in population (414,000) and area (316 sq km), but it is one of the most economically stable and has avoided the ill-fortunes that have befallen many of its much bigger neighbours.
“In 2009, Malta was one of the top-five performing EU economies in terms of GDP,” Prime Minister Lawrence Gonzi told local and international financial services practitioners at FinanceMalta’s annual conference in April. Although the island’s GDP declined by 1.9% last year, the drop was small compared with elsewhere in Europe.
More fascinatingly, the financial sector boomed in 2009. “We have seen it grow by 22%, clearly a tremendous growth rate considering the background in which that took place,” said the Prime Minister. “Our financial system came out of the turmoil relatively unscathed, largely thanks to our robust and stringent regulatory framework and our adherence to sound banking principles.”
The country’s small size used to be a weakness, but it is now a strength. “For once in our long-chequered history, small is beautiful and we adapt using our size as our strongpoint,” said Dr Gonzi. If local or foreign firms have problems, they can sit down “with the relevant minister and his top people to design tailor-made solutions, rather than the government implement safety packages or fiscal incentives around the whole island as if it was butter on toast, benefiting those who did not necessarily require support.
“Because technology has bridged the whole world, the size of the space we occupy has become a secondary matter. Within the services sector, if we use technology, if we use education, we can compete with anyone around the globe.” ... read more
|
Communauté RH
Communauté IT
Communauté Marketing
Communauté Banking & Finance
" Luxembourg has ratified sixty double tax treaties so far; four with African states, five with states of the American continent, twenty with Asian states and thirty-one with European countries. In 2009 and 2010 alone, Luxembourg…
News