Northern Ireland's financial sector growth is 'outpacing London'

A new report by industry advocacy group TheCityUK has indicated that Northern Ireland's financial sector (centred around Belfast) is outpacing London in growth.

London has been the UK's financial service sector's core location for years, with most of the country's top banks and financial institutions having their main offices in the city and a large percentage of the country's financial workers being based there. According to a new report by TheCityUK has indicated that Belfast may actually be an up and coming financial hub too, with its financial sector growth now rapidly outpacing London.

The financial sector in Northern Ireland grew by 6.1% in the 2016 to 2017 period with the addition of 2,000 new jobs, bringing the total number of financial sector employees in the region to around 35,000. While this is far behind London's colossal 776,000 financial sector employment figures and is still the lowest figure out of all UK regions, the growth of this sector has exploded locally.

A total of 19,500 of Northern Ireland's financial workers were centred in Belfast in 2017 according to the report, which represented 8.7% of all employment here and led to an estimated value of £1.7bn to the Belfast economy from the financial sector.

The report centres on figures from 2017, and the financial industry in Belfast has definitely grown rapidly since then thanks to growth in existing organisations and the rise of several new financial startups. The presence of the NI tech industry has helped to bolster this growth, with initiatives such as the Ulster Bank Accelerator and the Catalyst FinTech hub really paying off for the region.

Source: Belfast Telegraph, TheCityUK