Halifax is cementing its reputation as a mecca for financial services administrators, with Bermuda-based firms Marsh Captive Solutions Group and Butterfield Fulcrum Group Ltd. both having announced expansions to their successful operations in Nova Scotia’s capital city this year. Several other firms are setting up shop in the city for the first time.

Marsh is implementing and rolling out its new global initiatives and training to its offices around the world. For Marsh, an insurance broker and risk-management firm, its Halifax office has become the benchmark for productivity and technology adoption – and the firm has been growing its captive insurance servicing operation in Halifax steadily since opening in 2006. Currently, Marsh’s Halifax office services more than 300 captive accounts worldwide, many of them Fortune 500 companies.

As for Butterfield, one of the world’s top independent hedge fund administrators, it is increasing its workforce in Nova Scotia by up to 150 new jobs. The company’s senior management has designated the Halifax office a Global Centre of Excellence to service the firm’s international client base.

firms open offices

As a result of these successes, among others, several other companies are putting down roots in Halifax for the first time. Since April 2012, two international hedge fund administration firms – Cayman Islands-based Admiral Administration Ltd. (which was recently acquired by Malta-based Maitland International Holdings PLC) and San Francisco-based Conifer Fund Services LLC – have opened offices in Halifax.

In fact, Conifer has announced that it plans to make its fund administration office in Halifax a key centre for the company.

This boom is what Nova Scotia’s government had in mind when Nova Scotia Business Inc. (NSBI), the province’s economic-development agency, began successfully targeting alternative investment and other financial services firms in 2005 and persuading them to move some or all of their back-office operations to Halifax.

An historically close alliance with Bermuda, a major offshore centre for fund administration, proved to be a fertile starting ground to develop the sector, and several firms – including Citco Fund Services and Marsh – were among the first to open offices in the province.

Undoubtedly, the strategy has been a success. In fact, according to KPMG LLP‘s Competitive Alternatives 2012 report, Halifax is the fastest growing hedge fund administration centre in Canada. The city also ranks No. 1 among all Canadian and U.S. cities surveyed for the lowest business operating costs in the international financial services industry.

Those numbers are not anomalies, says Peter Hayes, partner and national director of alternative investments with KPMG in Toronto: “Halifax has been proving itself. It’s not a one-hit wonder.”

Adds Patricia Bradshaw, dean of the Sobey School of Business at Saint Mary’s University in Halifax: “A critical mass is happening.”

That’s because Nova Scotia’s capital city, with its population of approximately 400,000, offers financial services companies several distinct advantages: it is geographically well positioned, with relatively easy access to the northeastern U.S., Toronto and Europe; it’s an affordable city in which to do business; and, with more post-secondary institutions per capita than any other province, Halifax offers convenient access to a well-educated talent pool.

Such advantages are not unique to Halifax, though, notes Hayes: “Others make this pitch.”

So, what makes the C-suite sit up and listen when Nova Scotia comes calling?

NSBI is a key factor

There are two factors are at play. First, there is NSBI itself. “We’re unique because we’re run like a company,” says J.P. Robicheau, NBSI’s director of financial services and nearshore solutions in Halifax. “Our team has a business-development background. We’re a very aggressive bunch and results-oriented.”

Second, he adds, the provincial government supports this model and stays out of the way. In fact, it’s this factor that may distinguish NSBI from its counterparts across the country, Robicheau says: “My advice to other jurisdictions is that this model works. But it is not an easy pill to swallow – taking the politics out of economic development.”

The NSBI approach also is tempered with patience, and strives for measured growth. “There is a long-term sustainability in Halifax,” says Hayes. “Other regions – for example Dublin – have had explosive growth and they have saturated the market. Halifax is so far away from that saturation. It’s the tip of the iceberg of what it can do.”

Realism is another cornerstone of the province’s economic-development strategy. Says Bradshaw: “We don’t have the head offices, and we’ll never have the head offices. But we can have the startups and the satellite offices – and that is enough for a successful financial [services] sector.”

Another factor worth noting is that the Nova Scotia government is willing to sweeten the pot with financial incentives when financial services firms open or expand their offices in Halifax. Conifer, for example, is receiving $1.3 million from NSBI; Marsh, $1 million; and Butterfield is getting a substantial incentive.

This is money well spent, says Robicheau: “The government sees this as an investment – and a very good investment.”

Despite Halifax’s very visible success in this area, the city still grapples with a cloak of invisibility, says Hayes: “In the financial services world, most people don’t know where [Halifax] is. It will confound people sitting in an office in New York. That [remains] a big hurdle.”

But it’s a hurdle NSBI is well aware of and has been addressing – with some success, Robicheau says: “Our phones are starting to ring. This is a first. Firms know financial services companies are here, and they want to be part of the community.”

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