London’s combination of capital, skills and market infrastructure is not easily replicable, but insurers cannot take its status as a top global financial centre for granted. London’s business model is suited to a world of untrammelled globalisation, yet the direction of travel could be towards greater regionalisation or nationalisation of finance. The Ukraine war has accelerated the emergence of a ‘walled gardens’ world focused on self-sufficiency in energy, food and water within broader geostrategic and security frameworks. In such a world, London’s best hope could lie in becoming less of a global financial and insurance centre and more of European one, but this would require rapprochement with the EU, not regulatory divergence, which promises to be costly in terms of market access.
