Lord Mayor of London William Russell will begin a four-day visit to Dubai, Kuwait and Doha on Sunday (9th February), with the aim of further developing UK financial services ties with the region.
This will be his second visit in less than six weeks to the UAE, having given a keynote speech at last month’s Abu Dhabi Sustainable Finance Forum.
He will then head to Kuwait and Doha, where he will similarly be discussing opportunities for investment into the UK, as well ways in which the UK can help to develop the financial services sector in both countries. Part of his busy schedule will include a meeting with the Emir of Qatar.
The UK is the top investment destination in Europe for UAE, Kuwait and Qatar, and is Qatar’s top investment destination globally.
Its fintech sector had record investment in 2019, and grew year-on-year by 38 per cent – substantially faster than that of the USA, China and Singapore. It is home to more fintech start-up unicorns than anywhere else in Europe, and was recently placed first once more by Z/Yen for the quality of the offer of its green finance industry.
