London is home to more multi-millionaires than any other city in the world
London has more multi-millionaires than any other city in the world, new research reveals.
The UK’s capital is home to 4,400 “super-rich” people with net assets worth $30m (£20.7m) or more, excluding the value of their main house, figures from data provider Wealth Insight for 2015 show. This is up by 0.8 per cent over the previous year.
London is also racing ahead of other cities in terms of number of multi-millionaires. There are 25 per cent more multi-millionaires in London than closest rival Tokyo, and 29 per cent more than in third place Singapore. Last year, the gap with Tokyo was 22 per cent. The findings will be published today by Spear’s, the luxury magazine.
London’s status as the centre of world finance is the driving force behind its attraction to high net worth individuals according to Wealth Insight. It believes this is unlikely to diminish in the event of Brexit.
The data provider says that UK multi-millionaires in general are most likely to work in financial services, with 15 per cent of them employed in what is a key sector for London.
Other UK industries with many wealthy workers include retail, luxury goods, media, tech and real estate.
London’s standing as a financial hub is also a draw to foreign wealth. “The ready availability of so much financial expertise in London is highly attractive to the world’s high-net-worth individuals,” Christopher Silvester, editor of Spear’s, told Morning Wire “Many come for the property and British public schools as well.”
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Two other UK cities made the top 100 in the new survey. Birmingham came in at 65 in the chart with 138 multi-millionaires, and Edinburgh at 74 with 112 high net worth citizens.
New York, recently revealed by Morning Wire to be lagging behind London in a ranking of the world’s top financial centres, added 0.7 per cent to its total number of multi-millionaires, taking its number of super-rich residents to 3,028. This puts it in fourth place.
“If you’d asked me last year I’d have said Hong Kong or Beijing would be most likely to take London’s crown within the next decade but now New York has re-emerged as London’s biggest rival,” head of Wealth Insight Oliver Williams said.
The little-known Chinese city of Dalian, in the Liaoning Province, saw its population of multi-millionaires grow the fastest, at 5.4 per cent.
The Russian cities of St Petersburg and Moscow and Ukranian capital Kiev experienced the biggest drop in the number of super-rich.