GIFT City only Indian financial centre in Asia-Pacific top 15: Global index

They have been assessing financial centres since 2007, when then chief minister of Gujarat, now Prime Minister Narendra Modi, conceptualised GIFT City.

It has also improved its position in the GFCI FinTech ranking to 26th from 29th in the previous report, indicating responses that show favourable growth prospects.

This is based on a questionnaire asking respondents which centres they think will grow in significance over the next two to three years.

The GFCI report assesses 115 financial centres on their FinTech offering and identifies an

“innovation-supporting ecosystem, access to finance, skilled talent, the regulatory environment and ICT infrastructure as important elements of a competitive FinTech centre, ” the report stated.

Major shifts

Zurich ranked in the top 10, while San Francisco fell out of the group in the index, which assessed 117 financial centres worldwide.

New York is the only North American centre in the top 10; San Francisco, which was in fifth place in the

last index, dropped to 11th. While New York continues to lead the rankings, followed by London, Hong Kong, and Singapore, other American centres — Los Angeles, Chicago, Boston and Washington, DC —featured in the top 20.

“The largest fall in average ratings was in Eastern Europe & Central Asia, down 1.09%, and the largest increase was in Asia/Pacific, where average ratings were up 1.48%, ” the report states.

Among the top 15, seven are in the Asia/Pacific region while five are in the Middle East and Africa, highlighting the increasing importance of these regions in global finance.

The report identifies digital infrastructure, including cloud services, data connectivity and cybersecurity resilience; the attraction of FinTech and digital asset businesses; stronger anti-money laundering and financial crime frameworks; and deeper capital markets, as priority areas for financial centres over the next five years.

GFCI 40 draws on 144 instrumental factors and 39,531 assessments from 6,147 respondents to the GFCI online questionnaire.

GIFT City is claimed to be India’s first International Financial Services Centre. It has several firsts to its credit, like the opening of the country’s first offshore foreign university, when Australia’s Deakin University opened its international branch campus in 2024. This was followed by the University of Wollongong (Australia), Queen’s University, Belfast (United Kingdom), and Coventry University (UK).

The Gujarat Government also relaxed prohibition laws inside GIFT City in 2023, allowing wine-and-dine facilities in its hotels and the GIFT City club through easy drinking permits, making it more attractive for businesses and investment. The rest of Gujarat is under strict prohibition laws.

Currently, more than 100 companies have a presence in GIFT City.