Feb2016

The Financial Services Industry in Malta

09 February 2016

Financial services are one of the important sectors of the Maltese industry. Beyond the firms that cater to the local market many companies registered and operating from Malta mainly address foreign customers.

When being licensed in Malta companies can use the EU passport to use their license in other jurisdictions, obviously depending on the level of activities that they wish to perform in the foreign jurisdiction. To simply promote their products (without operating an actual office abroad) all the license holder needs to do is to apply the simpler version of this passporting facility which involves the Malta Financial Services Authority (MFSA) informing the foreign regulator.

Numbers of entities licensed by MFSA

According to the statistics published by MFSA, the following numbers of operational entities in the financial services sector can be distinguished:

Considering the banking industry, although the big two and a handful of other smaller banks that service the local market are well known, in actual fact as at 30th September 2015 there were 28 credit institutions and 39 financial institutions.

In the insurance sector, as at the end of September 2015 there were 62 licensed entities in the Non-Life, Life, Composite and Reinsurance categories. In the third quarter of 2015 there were 147 licensed Investment services firms in Malta, of which 108 had a Category 2 license (Licence Holders authorised to provide any Investment Service and to hold or control Clients’ Money or Customers assets, but not to operate a multilateral trading facility or deal for their own account or underwrite or place instruments on a firm commitment basis).

As at the same date, in the funds industry 26 recognised fund administrators were active in Malta. Malta has to ensure that it remains attractive for the existing companies to remain on the island and for new ones to continue to come to Malta.