A delegation from Guernsey has been in Moscow to raise the Island’s profile as an international investment funds centre.
The team was led by Fiona Le Poidevin, Deputy Chief Executive of Guernsey Finance – the promotional agency for the Island’s finance industry.
The itinerary included a series of meetings with investment managers, private banks, accountancy firms and law firms as well as attending the Russian Fund Forum which attracted around 150 delegates over two days at the Moscow Marriott Grand Hotel.
Miss Le Poidevin says: “Guernsey has attracted very well known and highly respected names in the Russian funds world such as VTB, Renaissance and Baring Vostok to either establish their own operations in the Island or work with the local service providers. Now we are looking to build on this success and raise Guernsey’s profile further in Moscow so that we can take advantage of the economic and social developments in Russia to bring more investment funds business to the Island.
“We held an initial fact-finding visit to Moscow in May last year and that helped us enormously in understanding the opportunities for Guernsey within the Russian market. It meant that we were able to have more targeted meetings and put across refined messages during this visit when we were both strengthening existing relationships and developing new contacts who are local fund specialists.
“We were very well received and there was a positive response to our message. It was interesting that the conference largely focused on the potential for investment into Russia and especially within private equity and real estate because Guernsey’s strength is in providing structuring and listing capabilities to help facilitate this business, in particular within these sectors.
“The Russian market is still relatively immature which means that there is much more potential for the future but there are already opportunities and we need to make sure that Guernsey is within the first tier of jurisdictions under consideration for this work.”
The Guernsey delegation was in Moscow from Monday 27 February through to Thursday 1 March, which came just ahead of the Presidential elections held last Sunday [4 March] and which saw President Putin re-elected for another term.
The Guernsey team comprised Miss Le Poidevin, Carey Olsen’s Andrew Boyce, Patricia White from Legis, Jonathan Robbins of Mercator and Andrew Whittaker from Ipes. Guernsey representatives from the offices of Butterfield Trust, Renaissance and KPMG were also in Moscow at the same time.
