The article you link to is using the 'City of London' to refer to London's financial sector, which is primarily located in the City of London (rather like the use of 'Washington' to refer to the US government). It's not talking about anything shady that the institutions of the City of London itself are doing.
Relevance? I haven't said whether I'm talking about the City of London's government or its financial institutions (as if there's a difference). None of which has to do with "secrecy" which is arguably the relevant topic. On that subject, whether it's the government or the financial institutions or both, if they're engaged in money laundering, which is more likely: They keep those matters secret, or they don't keep those matters secret?
The article we're all commenting on is talking about the City of London in the sense of the geographic area administered by the City of London Corporation.
The article you linked to is talking about the shenanigans of the UK's financial sector (mostly concentrated in the City of London).
The UK financial sector is regulated by the FCA. Corporations headquartered in the City of London are subject to English law just like corporations headquartered in any other part of the country. So the role that the City of London Corporation plays in money laundering is relatively minor and indirect. Of course, there may well be corruption that is worth investigating and exposing.
Unfortunately, the idea of the City of London as some kind of extraterritorial legal island within the UK is catnip to conspiracy theorists of various stripes. It is complete nonsense. However, that is not to say that the City of London Corporation is not in need of reform.
The article title includes "the secret City of London." Without clarification, it's left to readers to decide what that means. It could mean its government actively maintains a cloak of secrecy, it could just mean that it's not well known, say, to Americans, or it could mean something in between. The latter pole--that it's not well known, say, to Americans--has been established in this thread. What I'm trying to do is offer evidence to support the former pole. If there's corruption within the City of London, that supplies a motive for its financial institutions or its government (as if there's a difference) to shield the activities that occur there from scrutiny.
> The article title includes "the secret City of London." Without clarification, it's left to readers to decide what that means.
Generally speaking the etiquette on HN is to at least pretend that you've read the article. I've rarely seen someone so audaciously using the fact that they didn't read the article as a defense.
Whether or not there's an etiquette for HN, there's definitely guidelines for HN which among other things encourage commenters not to accuse each other of not reading the articles, and to give each other the benefit of the doubt.
As it happens, I did read the article before writing my first comment. That would be the article which uses the word "secret" in its title but neither "secret" nor "secrecy" anywhere else in the body. Put another way, having actually read the article, among the many interesting things it says, one thing I know it doesn't say is exactly what it means by its title
The UK financial services sector is involved in money laundering. That does not have much to do with its location in the City of London. The City of London Corporation is essentially just a local authority and does not have the kind of governing powers that would enable it to play a major role in money laundering. For example, it does not regulate financial transactions or pass laws (except the largely inconsequential local ‘byelaws’ that any UK local authority can pass).
> How many financial companies in the world are based there?
Many, for sure. Plenty more are headquartered in Canary Wharf, which is not in the City but in Tower Hamlets. These include Barclays, HSBC and Citigroup.
That's one way to put it. Another way to put it is "most". The City has the largest number of financial firms, the largest share of office space, and the largest share of trading volume and assets under management. It's home to the Bank of England and the London Stock Exchange, and will be home to HSBC when it finishes its move there from Canary Wharf.
Those firms have been accused--indirectly--of money laundering. If they're engaged in that vice, it's plausible to me they would add the additional vice of protecting it from scrutiny. I.e. engaging in "secrecy." It need not collude with the government to do so, but if it did it would hardly be the first time business and government colluded under a veil of secrecy.
As for what the actual City of London Corporation runs, since you didn't answer the question, I'll answer it for you. In addition to collecting bins and operating one school, it also runs a police department.
The firms you mention have certainly colluded with the government in Westminster, which is the one that regulates financial services. The City of London Corporation is merely a local authority (albeit a quirky one), and banks don't really need its cooperation in order to launder money. (HSBC did a fine job of it from Canary Wharf, for example.)
>it also runs a police department.
As do many other regions of the country. There's nothing surprising or sinister about this. There isn't any connection between this administrative fact and money laundering.
I'm not saying there's anything necessarily sinister or surprising about its police department. I'm just trying to be more complete. If we say the City just collects bins and runs one school, well that's not really giving the full picture, now is it?
Beyond that, consider this:
-The City has one of highest concentrations of global finance power in the world, if not the highest.
-That global finance power--global banking and commerce--has been accused of illicit activity, largely money laundering.
-If they do engage in that illicit activity, they probably collude with whatever governments they need to to advance their interests. It only makes sense.
-And, they probably would cloak these activities under a veil of secrecy. That also only makes sense.
Little if any of this is in dispute. What seems to be in dispute is the answer to these related questions:
Money laundering can happen anywhere, in Canary Wharf, in the Channel Islands, hell in New York and Delaware. But, is there something unique about the square mile? If so, what is it? Whatever conditions create a money laundering opportunity, are those conditions enhanced by what's unique about the City? And if it's not the Corporation, then what is it? If there's a high degree of money laundering there to go along with its high concentration of global finance power, then why is that? Because there hasn't been equivalent such accusations against New York and Delaware. The square mile has been called out as playing an outsized role in corruption. If that's true--supposing for the sake of argument it is--if that's true, then why? Is it just coincidence? Global finance and the vices it's indulged in had to land somewhere, and the City was as good a place as any?
