Hong Kong’s third-place ranking in the latest Global Financial Centres Index (GFCI) reinforces its status as a leading international financial center, but the detail behind the headline deserves greater attention. The city is building a more distinctive role at the meeting point of capital markets, technology and the Chinese mainland’s financial opening-up.
New York remains in first place while London is second, but the margins at the top are narrow. Hong Kong’s score of 756 puts it a single point behind London and one ahead of Singapore. Shanghai, in fifth place, is only two points back. This is a tightly packed group of global centers, each with established advantages and each facing a different test of relevance.
For Hong Kong, the real issue is not whether it outranks London or Singapore. What matters is whether the city is strengthening the foundations of its financial economy. The GFCI provides some encouraging answers. Hong Kong ranks first globally in fintech. It also ranks first in financial sector development, investment management, insurance, and finance. Those results point to an ecosystem with more depth than is often acknowledged.
The financial market’s return to form in 2025 makes this argument easier to sustain. Hong Kong was the world’s leading initial public offering fundraising venue in 2025, raising $37.4 billion through 119 listings, according to Dealogic figures cited by Hong Kong Exchanges and Clearing Ltd. Total equity fundraising, including follow-on issuance, reached $103 billion. Among other factors, the recovery reflected the continuing appeal of a market that can bring together mainland enterprises, global institutions and regional investors.
Hong Kong’s strength lies not only in its proven ability to raise capital but in adapting that liquidity, expertise and market infrastructure for an increasingly digital financial world. That is where the fintech ranking becomes more than a public-relations line. Fintech is no longer a peripheral industry made up of payment apps and startups competing for attention. It now spans compliance, trade finance, wealth management, insurance, market infrastructure, cybersecurity, digital assets and blockchain applications.
Hong Kong counted around 1,200 fintech companies in 2025, concentrated most heavily in digital assets and blockchain applications, wealth technology, and payments and remittances. There is also a growing practical framework around that activity. By late May, the Securities and Futures Commission had licensed 11 virtual-asset trading-platform operators, while further applications remained under consideration.
This is one reason Hong Kong’s place in Asian finance should not be viewed as a simple contest with Singapore, Shanghai, or Shenzhen. The region is becoming more financially dense. Six Asia-Pacific centers now sit in the global top 10: Hong Kong, Singapore, Shanghai, Tokyo, Seoul and Shenzhen. The region’s average rating rose more than that of any other in the latest index. That development creates competition, certainly, but it also creates opportunities for specialization and connection across a much larger regional system.
Hong Kong, Shanghai, Shenzhen, Singapore, and Tokyo are often grouped together as rival Asian financial centers, but that misses the point. Each is competing from a different base. Shanghai is supported by the scale of the mainland’s domestic capital markets. Shenzhen’s financial-center proposition is closely tied to its large technology and innovation economy. Singapore has built powerful networks across Southeast Asia and beyond. Tokyo remains a major center for institutional capital and was ranked first in the GFCI’s banking and trading subindices.
Hong Kong’s strength is different again. Under the “one country, two systems” framework, it has a unique advantage: It is part of China while retaining the international financial, legal and regulatory systems needed to connect mainland enterprises with global capital.
The city’s IPO performance shows that this function remains meaningful. Yet capital markets are only one part of the story. Hong Kong must ensure that funds raised here can be followed by a full range of services: treasury management, insurance, asset management, green finance, dispute resolution, data services and sophisticated compliance support. A durable financial center is one where a company can remain long after listing day.
The GFCI’s survey findings offer a sensible agenda. Respondents identified investment in digital infrastructure, including cloud capability, data connectivity and cyber resilience, as the most pressing issue for financial centers over the next five years. Attracting fintech and digital-asset businesses, strengthening efforts on anti-money-laundering and financial-crime controls, and deepening capital markets were also high priorities. These are not glamorous subjects. They are, however, where competitiveness will increasingly be decided.
Human capital is another test. Financial institutions need experienced bankers, lawyers, accountants and fund managers. They also need data scientists, cybersecurity specialists, product designers and compliance professionals who understand how regulation should work when transactions move at digital speed. The index’s respondents repeatedly highlighted the availability of skilled finance, legal, compliance and technology workers as decisive to a center’s prospects. Hong Kong’s universities, professional services sector and international character give it a substantial base, but the competition for talent is increasingly global.
The city has an additional advantage that is harder to reduce to statistics: a long-established reputation for handling complex cross-border business. In the GFCI’s assessment, Hong Kong enjoys a reputational advantage of 77 points, meaning professional perceptions of the city are materially stronger than the index’s underlying quantitative measures alone would indicate. This is valuable capital, earned over decades through commercial practice, institutional knowledge and the confidence of market participants.
Hong Kong’s place near the summit of global finance should therefore be treated neither as a reason for complacency nor as a prompt for anxiety whenever another city has a strong year. Its challenge is more practical. It must make the next generation of finance as reliable and usable as the last: technologically capable, internationally legible, properly regulated and connected to the economic dynamism on its doorstep.
The city’s unique advantage is its ability to connect the mainland with global markets. By combining international capital access, trusted regulation, deep professional services and financial innovation, the city is well placed to strengthen its role as the leading bridge between Chinese enterprises and global finance.
The author is an international partner and member of the Global Advisory Board, MilleniumAssociates AG.
The views do not necessarily reflect those of China Daily.
