The World Economic Forum's annual competitiveness report has confirmed Malta's place as one of the world's top financial jurisdictions; this bodes well for your clients' international pensions, says our expert
The Malta Financial Services Authority has been shouting from the rooftops about the latest Global Competitiveness Report from the World Economic Forum – and well it should. It says the "increasing soundness" of Malta's banking institutions can be seen in a significant improvement in the relevant score, now putting the country amongst the best 10 rankings, up four from last year's report. Malta also maintained its 13th position in terms of the strength of auditing and reporting standards.
This year's WEF report provides an overview of the competitiveness performance of 144 economies, and continues to be a highly comprehensive assessment of economic performance. It contains a detailed profile for each of the economies included in the study, as well as an extensive section of data tables with global rankings covering over 100 indicators. For the sixth consecutive year Switzerland leads the table, ahead of Singapore as the second-most competitive economy in the world.
Overall, Malta has again been ranked amongst the top 50 nations in terms of competitiveness and has maintained its status of an innovation-driven economy.
Malta maintained high scores in important sectors which strengthen its proposition as an investment location, ranking amongst the top 20 nations with regards to the quality of education and health services offered.
In its introduction, the World Economic Forum notes that this report comes at a time when the world "seems to be finally emerging from the worst financial and economic crisis of the past 80 years and returning to a pre-crisis situation: large interest rate spreads for public debt in hard-hit countries are falling; banking systems seem more robust, even if financial reform has not yet been completed; and access to credit, while still limited, is slowly recovering." Overall, it adds, growth prospects in advanced economies are better than they have been in recent years, albeit very unevenly distributed.
All of this good news for Malta as a jurisdiction for pensions. Sound authorities and strong financial outlooks are essential to ensuring your clients' pensions remain robust.
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