ZCZC
BCN-31
FRANCE-BRITAIN-BANKING-BREXIT
Brexit to create 3,500 finance jobs in Paris: industry group
PARIS, July 11, 2018 (BSS/AFP) – Britain’s moves towards exiting the European
Union are already expected to create some 3,500 finance and banking jobs in
Paris as leading players in the sector move their operations out of London,
an industry group said Wednesday.
The figure “is much higher than the direct job transfers to other European
financial capitals,” Gerard Mestrallet, president of the lobby group Paris
Europlace, said at the opening of the group’s annual conference.
The US asset management giant Blackrock and the bank Citigroup are among
the companies planning to move some activities to Paris, according to British
media reports.
On top of an estimated 3,500 jobs seen as likely so far, the transfers
could generate an additional 20,000 indirect jobs in the French capital, said
Mestrallet.
He attributed the shifts to Paris to labour law overhauls and other
measures taken by President Emmanuel Macron, a former Rothschild investment
banker who is pushing to make France more attractive to foreign investors.
“We’ve made more progress in the past two years in Paris than over the
previous 13 years,” he said, citing in particular the end of a wealth tax on
financial assets and a new flat tax on capital income, including dividends
and interest payouts.
London has long been Europe’s top financial centre, and analysts have
predicted a wave of job transfers to the continent by banks and insurance
companies as Britain prepares to leave the union in March 2019.
Leading companies in other sectors have also warned they might move
operations out of the country, including Airbus, BMW and Siemens.
Paris has several rivals for the post-Brexit business, including Frankfurt,
Amsterdam and Dublin.
BSS/AFP/SR/1745 HRS