Long term competitiveness

Navigating change, driving growth: Annual report and accounts 2025-26

16 September 2026

5 minutes

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Our annual report 'Navigating Change, Driving Growth', sets out the key outcomes and achievements we have delivered over the past year and our accounts for FY 2025-26.

TheCityUK in numbers

331
events and meetings with over 7,300 attendees***

Our most popular email campaign open rates are over
30%
higher than the industry average**

Responded to
37
government, regulatory and
parliamentary consultations

Generated over
2,300
print, online and broadcast news pieces in over 12 countries***

140
meetings with policymakers and key political stakeholders

Increased LinkedIn followers by
13%
and over 600K impressions***

In our 2026 member survey*, we scored 90% or over for:

Building and maintaining relationships with policymakers

Our objectives and activities being aligned with those of our members

Our favourability among members

Our our events programme allowing members to engage on key issues with senior stakeholders

*TheCityUK member survey 2026, run independently by Mustard
**Source: Campaign Monitor
***Data inclusive of the period from July 2025 - 2026

Highlights from across the year

Miles Celic OBE, Chief Executive Officer, Annual Conference 2026

Miles Celic OBE, Chief Executive Officer, Annual Conference 2026

Our Director International Development, Anna Rogers, and Managing Director, International, Nicola Watkinson, with the then Chancellor, Rt Hon Rachel Reeves MP, at the Ukraine Recovery Conference

Our Leadership Council Chair, Anne Richards DBE, in conversation with Rt Hon Peter Kyle MP, the then Secretary of State for Business and Trade, at our International Conference

The US Ambassador to the UK, H.E. Warren A Stephens, delivering a keynote address at our International Conference

Rt Hon David Lammy MP, the then Deputy Prime Minister, delivering a keynote address at our Annual Dinner

Our Board Chair, Omar Ali CBE, in conversation with Lucy Rigby KC MP, Economic Secretary to the Treasury, at our Annual Dinner

Rt Hon Kemi Badenoch MP, Leader of the Opposition, delivering a keynote address at our Annual Conference

Key outcomes

Campaigned and lobbied on the Financial Services and Markets Bill, which is currently going through Parliament and marks a major step towards reforms to strengthen growth and competitiveness

Achieved the inclusion of a three-year Stamp Duty holiday for newly UK-listed companies in the 2025 Budget.

Delivered industry asks for the UK-US Transatlantic Taskforce, ensuring a time-bound roadmap and strong industry engagement for the implementation phase.

Ensured innovation was central to wholesale markets reforms ahead of the appointment of Chris Woolard CBE as Wholesale Digital Markets Champion, representing a key step towards digitisation, tokenisation and greater competitiveness.

Developed international financial centres and financial reforms in markets including Ukraine, Vietnam, Mongolia, Azerbaijan and Nigeria.

Helped secure industry outcomes on the Financial Ombudsman Service and the Senior Managers and Certification Regime to improve competitiveness and reduce unnecessary regulatory burden

Helped dilute the Government’s proposed mandatory investment powers in the Pensions Schemes Act 2026.

Lobbied successfully against proposed new director liabilities, with the proposed legislation dropped.

Advanced devolution and regional investment by strengthening local investment propositions and influencing reforms to planning, local growth and devolved decision-making.

Offered practical ways the UK and the EU can collaborate and jointly finance important areas of the economy, such as defence and resilience, leading to increased jobs, investment and trade, through our report ‘Priorities for advancing UK-EU relations’.

Eliminated foreign ownership limits for Indian insurance companies through the work of the India-UK Financial Partnership.

Delivered technical teach-ins for UK local and devolved government for the Office for Investment’s Strategic Investment Opportunities Unit, while also showcasing investment opportunities to members.

Secured changes to standard venture capital and private equity investor documentation to prevent inadvertent exclusion of broad categories of defence and defence-related investment.

Set out how to capture greater growth from servicing global Islamic finance needs, the fastest-growing segment of the industry, through our report ‘Islamic finance and UK economic prosperity: A vision for growth’.

Our charter commitments

We remained focused on delivering our signatory commitments across the Women in Finance Charter and Race at Work Charter. For the financial year ending March 2026, and in our 2026 submission to the Women in Finance Charter, our senior management gender split was 57%:43% women to men. We continued to monitor diversity across the organisation as part of our commitment to the Race at Work Charter. Of the 53 employees surveyed: 73.5% identified as White; 24.5% identified as Black or Asian, both of these increased year on year; and 2% identified as mixed ethnicity, which was down on last year.

Read the full report Read the report online