Vickers ‘sceptical’ about banks moving abroad

Britain's Independent Commission on Banking has said that the risk of UK banks moving abroad as a result of incoming regulatory measures is very low.

Addressing rumours that HSBC, Barclays and Standard Chartered were thinking of moving their headquarters out of London, the head of the Commission John Vickers said that he was "sceptical".

"Any board contemplating moving would need to pay very careful attention" to a "whole host of practical obstacles, legal obstacles and reputational obstacles", he said at a conference yesterday.

The Commission's interim report concluded that as only £6bn of the Treasury's £53.4bn revenue in 2009-10 from financial services was from corporation tax, the loss would not be too great if a few banks did move.

The report also said that the presence of banks was not necessarily key to the success of the City.

Read a full report at the Guardian. ·