Luxembourg for Finance

‘Taxes are poison for companies hit by the crisis,’ Xavier Bettel told a Luxembourg for Finance online panel on Thursday. He added that when seeking to restore balance to state finances ‘we want to avoid any tax rise.’ Instead ‘maybe we’ll have to cut or delay some projects.’

That said he had no regrets about the government’s aggressive support measures for the Luxembourg economy. ‘This money has been some of best investment we could do,’ he said.

‘Cod quotas traded for Mifid equivalences,’ is how Luxembourg For Finance CEO Nicolas Mackel humorously characterised how the on-going Brexit discussions might unfold.  He was introducing the Focus On Brexit webinar hosted by LFF on 13th October, in which industry insiders traced some possible future scenarios.

Luxembourg wants to be the leading global centre in sustainable finance by 2025. It also wants to keep increasing the number of foreign banks and asset managers active in the country and strengthen its role as a wealth management hub by attracting more family offices.

Some 60 financial firms have announced relocations of activities to Luxembourg since the referendum in 2016. The final number will probably top 75 firms, as some have not yet made their plans public, Luxembourg for Finance CEO Nicolas Mackel said in an interview with Investment Officer.

“In 2018, 21 banks active [in Luxemburg] for more than three years had a cost to income ratio in excess of 100%, and there could be more this year,” CSSF director general Claude Marx said recently. As in the rest of Europe, Luxembourg’s B2C banks in particular are under diverse pressures. Some tough strategic choices are required.