I recently attended the third annual “FinTechStage” conference in Luxembourg. The conference organizes start-ups, investors, financial institutions, tech vendors and regulators to discuss the evolving financial market ecosystem. Having attended the conference last year, I was curious to see how the agenda, discussion points and perspectives might have changed in the past12 months particularly around the areas of Luxembourg’s role as a financial hub post-Brexit and the overall digitalisation of the wealth and investment industry, including AI and RegTech.

The opening comments were quick to address how Luxembourg has continued to reap the “benefits” of Brexit - an increasing number of firms are investing in and setting up operations in Lux (41% of asset managers have suggested moving their ops to Lux where there is an 18% corporate tax rate and an incubator (dubbed the “Loft”) for fintechs), and this optimistic undertone carried through the course of the conference. The Grand Duchy of Luxembourg, Pierre Gramegna pointed out that going forward, a collaborative relationship with London would be the key to success.