QUITE often the summer months are classed in journalistic terms as ‘the silly season’ – that time of the year when everyone has decanted off to the beach, there is therefore not a great deal happening and as a result the media almost need to make up stories or at least use those that otherwise would never have seen the light of day. In business terms there is also a tendency for deals to go off the boil in favour of the obligatory annual pilgrimage to Chiantishire, albeit in the last couple of years at least there has been little let-up in the flow of deals and precious little time to grab even a short break from the desk, such has been the momentum of business flowing into the island – and still it continues.

I was talking to a major introducer of business into the island a couple of weeks ago in London and while he was glad this year to have been able to snatch a quick week in between deals this summer – a fact that seems to be confirmed by local firms – he was again hard at it and the pipeline of business – most of which would find its way to Guernsey – was as robust as ever and he didn’t see any let-up in volumes despite the recent ‘glitch’ in the markets.

Granted some deals have fallen by the wayside and locally that is certainly true where the markets have taken their toll, but even so there are funds still launching and the flights to London are still full of marketeers looking for new business.

London has historically been very fertile ground for all the island’s finance industry and of course it still is – as evidenced by the recent visit of the Lord Mayor of the City of London, renewing those strong links. These will be reinforced when Guernsey representatives accompany his delegation’s visit to China in October.

We are also looking at the UK regions this month and taking the Guernsey funds story to Manchester, Leeds and Edinburgh to find new players who will see Guernsey as an opportunity. Later in the year we take the roadshow to Switzerland and then in next year to the USA to talk to private equity and hedge fund houses to again spread the word and capitalise on the business we already do with Swiss and US promoters but where we can encourage more to see us as the jurisdiction of choice.

So no silly season for us – work goes on regardless of the time of year to ensure the message is out there and reinforced as the first inkling anyone gets that we are not doing that is when they think we are possibly closed for business and that is the last message we want to be out there.

G is still very much for marketing and business development, service and innovation.