Today's Edition
MAYS IBRAHIM (ABU DHABI)
Abu Dhabi has been ranked 12th worldwide and first in the Middle East and North Africa in the inaugural edition of the Global Financial Centre Competitiveness Index (FCCI), unveiled on Tuesday at Abu Dhabi Finance Week.
It is the product of a collaboration between NYU Abu Dhabi, the Descartes Institute for the Future, and the Institute for Global Financial Competitiveness.
The index places the UAE capital just outside the global top ten with an overall score of 52.99, ahead of regional peers Dubai (14th), Riyadh (26th) and Doha (29th).
The top five financial hubs remain dominated by long-established centres: New York, London, Singapore, Hong Kong, and Tokyo.
Abu Dhabi’s strongest performance is in Institutional Environment, where it ranks 5th globally, scoring highly for governance and regulatory quality.
Within this category, the emirate earned a 1st-place ranking in regulatory innovation and came in third in business support incentives.
Abu Dhabi ranks 9th under the Resources pillar, buoyed by strong capital indicators. It places 2nd globally in state capital, 3rd in equity trading, 8th in greenfield investment and 14th in educational attainment.
Speaking with Aletihad, Robert Salomon, Dean of NYU Stern at NYU Abu Dhabi, said the capital base remains one of Abu Dhabi’s core strengths.
“More financial institutions are starting to locate here in Abu Dhabi,” he said. “While capital traditionally flowed from the Gulf region to the West, increasingly what we're starting to observe is capital is now starting to flow into the Gulf region.”
The trend is not fully reversed, he noted, but greater opportunities in areas like tech, manufacturing, AI, and energy are triggering investment flows into the region.
“The region is growing quickly,” added Solomon. “I would not be surprised that in the next 10, 15, 20 years, Abu Dhabi grew to become one of the top echelon financial centres in the world, among the likes of places like New York, London, Singapore.”
The index places Abu Dhabi 19th in Future Readiness, with strong technology infrastructure indicators, including 1st in internet access and cybersecurity, and 2nd in both mobile and fixed broadband speeds.
Salomon noted that emerging technologies will be decisive in shaping the global competitiveness of financial centres — especially AI and fiat-based digital currencies and stablecoins.
The report also identifies talent as “the secret sauce” to future-proofing the successful finance centres.
Salomon noted that global talent flows are shifting as stricter policies in traditional hubs make it “more challenging” for skilled workers to enter.
“Abu Dhabi is becoming a place that is attracting talent because they’re making it easier for people to come here and to stay,” he said. “That is one of the opportunities the Gulf has to capitalise on at a time when the West is making it harder.”
According to Salomon, this index is designed to guide investors and policymakers by showing where growth opportunities lie and what ingredients strong financial centres need, offering an annual record to track their progress.
