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The report by the think tank Centre for Cities – supported by the City of London Corporation –‘London links: the geography of financial services in the capital and beyond’, looks at how much individual cities across the UK export in services, and what proportion of these services exports came from the financial sector.
It finds that cities such as Cardiff (81%), Northampton (76%), Leeds (71%) and Edinburgh (69%) rely heavily on finance as their major services exporter. Comparatively the financial sector makes up 41% of London’s entire services exports.
Financial services accounted for at least a quarter of total exports in nine of the 63 cities evaluated, including Ipswich (25%), Bristol (26%), and Swindon (34%).
Of the UK’s cities most reliant on financial services exports, more than half voted to leave the European Union in the referendum two years ago*.
It is estimated that a third of all UK financial services exports go to the European Union, or approximately 36% of the total. This is followed by the US (21%), Japan (6%) and Canada (1%). [...]