Download Gibraltar International Business Hub

PROMOTION | ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT
Gibraltar
International Business Hub
G
ibraltar has served as the gateway
to the Mediterranean for centuries, and it is a preferred entry
point to the European Union
(EU). It provides access to a market of 520
million, and to North Africa—with Morocco
less than 10 miles away—across its famous
strait. A British Overseas Territory since 1713,
Gibraltar not only benefits from a legal system inherited from the United Kingdom, but
is home to a unique mix of cultures at a strategic meeting point of civilizations.
The Rock, as it is commonly known, is
an economic powerhouse in its own right,
founded on financial services, e-commerce
communications, maritime services and
tourism. Gibraltar’s GDP grew by 35% in the
last five years, ranking it among the top ten
economies by GDP growth worldwide, and
the government is looking beyond its traditional European markets to cultivate closer
business relationships with Bermuda, Hong
Kong, South Africa and the U.S.
As part of their effort to increase links
with potential international partners, Chief
Minister Fabian Picardo and Deputy Chief
Minister Dr. Joseph Garcia visited Washington, D.C., this March. While there, they met
with representatives of the U.S. Department
of Commerce and the American Chamber
of Commerce, which collaborated to launch
the Gibraltar-American Chamber of Commerce (AmCham) earlier in the month.
Under Picardo’s pro-business leadership,
Gibraltar is one of the simplest and safest
places to establish and operate a company
in Europe. More than 18,000 companies
are currently registered, paying corporation tax rates of just 10%. But Gibraltar is no
tax haven. Since 2009, it has figured on the
Organization for Economic Cooperation
and Development’s (OECD) white list of
territories that follow international standards for exchanging fiscal information.
This May, the U.S. and Gibraltar signed
an intergovernmental agreement (IGA)
to improve international tax compliance. Based on effective infrastructure for
automatic information exchange, both
governments will lend mutual assistance in
tax matters, with the goal of implementing
the U.S.’s Foreign Account Tax Compliance
Act (FATCA).
“Gibraltar is totally transparent, in terms
of taxes, with the main economies around
the world,” Chief Minister Picardo points
out. “We have tax-information agreements
with the U.S. and all other members of
the EU. We have extended the OECD’s tax
information and exchange information
with all the signatories of the multilateral
convention.”
Some 30,000 residents live within Gibraltar’s tiny 2.5-square-mile territory, but the
population swells by over a third every day
as some 10,000 people cross the border to
go to work. While the unemployment rate
in the surrounding area of Spain is 35%,
Gibraltar has a jobless rate of just 2.5%, in
addition to a highly educated, skilled and
multilingual workforce, making it a great
place to live and do business.
Gibraltar Section Project Manager: Maria Nadolu | For more information, contact: Gabriel Gutiérrez—[email protected] | Statistical data and photos: H.M. Government of Gibraltar
ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT | PROMOTION
A Successful Formula for
Investment
Last June, in his second budget speech as
Chief Minister, Picardo revealed that Gibraltar’s
economy surpassed $2 billion, driven by strong
growth in its financial services and online gaming industries. The winning combination of his
government’s staunchly pro-business stance
and a dynamic and diversified private sector is
paying rich dividends to all stakeholders.
“We have developed banking, insurance and
online gaming extensively, so investment has
come,” explains Deputy Chief Minister Joseph
Garcia. “Some of the largest gaming companies
in the world are based in Gibraltar. They are here
because we have a system of regulation that is
second to none. We have been very successful in
attracting investment to the extent that we can
choose who we let in. We want only the best.”
Gibraltar Minister of Financial Services and
Gaming Albert Isola is a busy man, but in the
next few months he will truly have his work cut
out for him. “There is a whole slew of legislation
we are introducing to improve our financial services’ framework,” he says. “This is being done
in partnership with the private sector—listening
to what they need products to do, and ensuring
they are OECD and EU compliant.”
Gibraltar is “situated at one of the main
crossroads of world trade,” says Manuel Tirado,
Deputy Captain of the Gibraltar Port Authority.
Minister for Tourism, Commercial Affairs, Public
Transport and the Port Neil Costa believes that
“it is the most competitive and reliable port in
the Mediterranean. We are promoting the port
as a maritime hub where customers receive
cost-effective services from leading maritime
industry operators.” He adds that with a new air
terminal, Gibraltar has excellent air services, and
is working hard to sustain and expand them. n
Why Gibraltar?
Prime location
•D
irect access to Europe and Africa, the
Mediterranean Sea and the North Atlantic
Ocean
• Able to distribute competitively priced VATfree goods and services to the markets of the
EU and Africa
Booming economy
• GDP: $2.07 billion; GDP growth: 7.8%
• GDP per capita (PPP): $65,027
Low costs
• A quality, low-tax jurisdiction with a profitoriented capital base
• Benefits from EU membership
• Corporate tax rate: 10%
Demographics
• Total population: 30,001
• Annual visitor arrivals: 11,787,015
Q&A With Gibraltar’s
Honorable Chief Minister,
Fabian Picardo
Gibraltarian by birth, Fabian Picardo
studied law at Ox ford Universit y
before returning home to join a leading law firm. A founder of the Gibraltar
National Party, he joined the Gibraltar
Socialist Labour Party (GSLP) in 2003
and became a member of Parliament
the same year. He assumed the party’s
leadership in 2011, before leading
the GSLP to election victory and his
appointment as chief minister of a
coalition government that December.
Following the global financial crisis, we are starting to see trade and
employment recovering. How has
Gibraltar fared?
In the years that the world was going
through the worst of the crisis, Gibraltar was weathering the storm quite
well. Growth in our economy is actually ahead of what you might find
anywhere else in Europe, and of the
type that you might see in some Asian
economies. Of course, we are dealing
with a small economy, so it is easier to
weather a storm as long as we ensure
that the robust parts of what makes
Gibraltar tick remain strong, even in
times of economic crisis.
What have been your main challenges to date as chief minister?
It was important that we change the
government from one that was an
obstacle to business to a fast-moving,
dynamic institution that facilitates
business and makes decisions like a
private-sector body when it needs to.
Our private-sector partners required
us to produce better value for the
money. I think taxpayers and the
voters, who are the shareholders of
Gibraltar, are entitled to demand the
same of me and of my fellow ministers.
That sounds like a private-sector
mentality, no?
We have an eye on the bottom line. We
need to make it easy to do business.
We need to make sure we maximize
employment. We need an educated
population. These are things you
would be looking at if you were CEO
of a multinational corporation, and
they should also be things I look at as,
in effect, the CEO and the Chairman
of Gibraltar PLC—transparency and
accountability to our shareholders, the
electors of Gibraltar.
How would you describe
Gibraltar’s workforce?
Gibraltar has fantastic human capital.
In 1988, we made a groundbreaking
decision to finance any university
degree for every Gibraltarian. Our
opponents said it would bankrupt
Gibraltar, but it has produced the
greatest bank of workers in Europe. We
are able to turn our skills to any sector and provide a workforce for any
international company that may want
to come. And we are not afraid of competition; we have a job market open to
the 520 million people in the EU and
grant work permits very liberally. That
has served Gibraltar well, because we
have learned from those who come
from outside, in terms of both work
ethic and skills.