Here is a brief overview of a Gibraltar-themed summit organised by this news service in London earlier this year.

The unsustainable debt burden of the West, the challenge of Brexit and threats to financial privacy were among some of the issues discussed at a Gibraltar-themed summit organised by the publisher of this news service earlier this year.

Gathering at the Gibraltar Government Office in The Strand, central London, figures from the Gibraltarian financial community, and wider wealth management world, met to discuss a range of issues that have erupted – not least the UK vote in June 2016 to quit the European Union.

One of the most intense sessions featured Egon Von Greyerz, the founder and managing partner of Matterhorn Asset Management. Von Greyerz is a noted bear on global equities and other risk assets, arguing that almost a decade of financial money-printing activity by central banks – aka quantitative easing – as well as continued heavy indebtedness in the West, bodes ill for global markets. He is an advocate of gold as a wealth preservation tool. In economic terms, people are not “buying assets but buying bubbles”.

The conference kicked off by addressing Gibraltar’s own potential as a financial centre in the current climate, before switching to issues around tax, IFCs and the most effective places to guard investors’ assets, followed by a discussion around trust and other structures for holding wealth. Asset allocation, and finally, the most promising areas for real estate investing, rounded out the event. 

Speakers were Ashley King-Christopher, partner, of Charles Russell Speechlys; Carlos Ibàñez, head of investments, Lombard Odier; David Inglesfield, managing director of ZEDRA, London; Egon Von Greyerz, founder and MD of Matterhorn Asset Management; Joey Imossi, business development director, Fiduciary Group; Jonathan Gomez, director of capital markets, LendInvest, Louis Montegriffo, co-founder and MD, BMI Group Estate Agents, Michael Carlton, CEO, BetVictor; Miles Dean, managing partner, Milestone International Tax Partners; Paul Astengo, senior executive, Gibraltar Finance, Stefan Velvick, senior client manager, private clients/charitable trusts, Stephen Reyes, tax partner & managing partner of Deloitte Gibraltar.

Sponsors of the summit were Gibraltar Finance; BMI Group; Deloitte and Fiduciary Group.

For more about this event, click here.