By any yardstick, Dublin is one of Europe’s most alluring cities. It is visited in ever-rising numbers by all manner of tourists. Film stars, rock legends, best-selling writers and politicians in search of their roots mingle, happily enough for the most part, with American and Japanese visitors, pre-wedding parties over from Britain for the weekend and bunches of earnest individuals eager to sample a variety of alcohol-enhanced cultural, literary and sporting experiences.
One of the city’s most abiding charms is its almost total lack of snobbery or prejudice, allied to a world-famed and thoroughly-deserved reputation for unstinting hospitality and a whole-hearted enthusiasm for enjoyment.
Nowadays, as so often in the past, Dublin is home to an impressive concentration of artistic, cultural, dramatic and literary talent, mostly drawn by Ireland’s generous tax treatment of its earnings. Business and social life in the city are booming and the dramatic growth of the past decade is expected to continue. Current forecasts are for annual growth of between 6-7 percent for the next five years.
‘The only trouble,’ said one travel-weary fund manager, ‘is that the traffic is appalling and it’s getting worse. Most days it seems as if everyone in and around Dublin wants to drive into the city center. The result is permanent gridlock.’
Top Rank
Cars are one thing. Money is another. Funds move into and out of Dublin with ease, greatly helped by successive governments’ innovative and supportive approach to the country’s financial services industry. Indeed, according to the latest figures from Technimetrics, Dublin was the fastest growing European equity center last year, recording a 45 percent increase in funds under management to $23.3 bn.
Over the past 20 years, the Irish financial sector has developed substantially. Ireland’s accession to the European Union in 1973 and its membership of the EMS since 1979 led to the effective severing of many of the centuries-old economic and financial links between the country and the UK, which in turn served to foster a rapid development of indigenous (or, at least, locally-headquartered) financial institutions.
The rate of change has accelerated massively in the past ten years, following the establishment in March 1987 of the city’s International Financial Services Centre (IFSC) and in May 1989 of the Irish Future and Options Exchange (IFOX). Companies setting up in the IFSC gain a whole basket of tax incentives, including reduced rates of corporation tax, relief from local municipal taxes, and tax reliefs on capital expenditure and rental payments. The corporation tax concession is restricted to financial services business conducted with non-residents in foreign currencies. To date, some 250 companies have located in the center and there is not now enough space to accommodate all those businesses that wish to be there. Would-be tenants are operating under license from offices all around the city.
‘The government’s aim,’ says a finance department insider, ‘has always been to liberalize the financial sector in Ireland and take some of the cream away from London.’ In that, it has been remarkably successful.
Patrick Leamy, sales director of Chase Bank, says that the government’s original intention was to create in Ireland something that had not been there before. ‘The financial services sector in Ireland was fairly small before the IFSC was set up, and the government set out to attract labor-intensive financial services operations to the city. The communications system was upgraded and massive tax incentives were offered.’
Now that the momentum has been established Leamy says the main challenge is to maintain cost competitiveness.
Dublin’s financial community likes presentations and most meetings and briefings are well attended. The principal problem is exactly where to hold them. There are no dedicated conference facilities in the city and the Dublin Chamber of Commerce, backed by the business and financial communities, has been lobbying strenuously for several years for an international standard conference center to be built in Dublin.
‘A conference center is very badly needed,’ says Mary Finan, managing director of Wilson Hartnell PR, one of the city’s leading organizers of company presentations. ‘The previous government was on the point of selecting one of three possible sites, but we’re now having to wait to see what the new administration decides.’ The front-runner is a scheme to extend the existing facilities at the Royal Dublin Society’s complex at Ballsbridge, although a strongly-favored alternative would place a brand new purpose-built center in the city’s Phoenix Park.
Meanwhile, most presentations take place in one or other of the city’s mushrooming hotels. Two new five-star hotels, a Hilton and a Marriott, are coming to the city and there has been a rash of new arrivals over the past three to four years.
Favorite venues – for companies and investors – are the Berkeley Court, at Ballsbridge on the city’s south side, and the Conrad, off St Stephen’s Green in the center. Generally, say the experts, Dublin’s most famous hotel, the Shelbourne on St Stephen’s Green, should be avoided for meetings. Although well-placed, it is decidedly noisy during the daytime. Jurys’ three-star Custom House Inn is at the heart of the financial center but its facilities are described as fairly basic.
An attractive alternative is the university-owned Newman House, further around St Stephen’s Green. Catering can be provided by The Commons, located in the basement and rapidly becoming one of Dublin’s better restaurants.
The city’s stockbrokers generally offer good quality conference and meeting facilities, and these are well-used by presenting companies, as are the banks’ own facilities at the IFSC and elsewhere.
The fly in the ointment, unfortunately, is that with the exception of several German and other European groups, many funds have their stock buyers elsewhere. ‘Dublin is largely a back-office operation,’ says one American banker, ‘and not all that many roadshows come through.’
This point is reinforced by Mark Kenny, IR manager at Jefferson Smurfit Group, one of Ireland’s largest industrial companies. ‘A lot of the work in Dublin is custodial, and most of the institutions do not have investment decision-makers in the city.’
The upside, though, is that a number of those who set up in Dublin have found a lot of potential for growth and profit that they had not expected and interest is rising steadily. Fund managers are growing in number in the city and the scope for successful presentations is increasing accordingly.
Separate Rewards
One good tip is not to mix brokers and fund managers in the same meeting. ‘Dublin brokers and analysts tend to ask a lot of questions,’ says one battle-scarred roadshow organizer, ‘while the fund managers generally sit there quietly. We have found it more rewarding to arrange separate meetings, and to make sure that our client’s senior directors are on hand for the fund managers’ presentation. Like most others, I expect, Dublin fund managers like to think they’re something special, worthy of closer and more personal attention. Making the finance director or the chief executive available after the presentation works wonders.’ Others agree. ‘Dublin’s analysts, of whom there aren’t all that many anyway, tend to want very specific details and factual information and are quite happy to make do with an investor relations manager,’ says a Dublin-based IR officer. ‘Fund managers, on the other hand, want to know about policy and strategy, about future plans and prospects, and they expect to hear it from the chiefs rather than the Indians.’ Breakfast meetings are becoming more acceptable, although the late-morning-into-lunchtime presentation remains the norm. Analysts in the city tend to like comprehensive printed information before or during the meeting, while the fund managers prefer one-on-one or small group briefings afterwards. The atmosphere in Dublin’s financial institutions is good, although the broking community spends a lot of its time scrapping over a relatively small domestic equity market. There is a good deal of work around as institutions seek to rebalance their portfolios in readiness for the single currency market. Irish companies are tending to concentrate on non-domestic markets, as Mark Kenny underlines. ‘We are giving primacy to overseas markets and the main thrust of our IR activities is aimed there.’ Jefferson Smurfit has increased the foreign presence on its register from around 20 percent to nearly 35 percent. Kenny sees the Dublin-based institutions as taking the same route. ‘Preparations for the advent of the single European currency are having a significant impact on domestic institutional activity,’ he says, ‘and there is a marked capital outflow.’ Jefferson Smurfit only mounts roadshows or major presentations when something really significant is underway or proposed. ‘Mostly,’ says Kenny, ‘we arrange a group meeting when the results are announced, and put on a dinner with the chairman and the CEO for a small number of analysts and managers.’
Time to Relax
Once the business is out of the way, Dublin offers a splendid opportunity to relax and enjoy what is rapidly becoming a very cosmopolitan city that manages to retain its unique blend of Irish hospitality and worldly-wise sophistication. The whole place is relaxing, and there is a great danger that visitors could be led astray by the city’s love of spontaneity and fun. Part of Dublin’s charm is things tend to just happen. Lunchtime and the evening are the best parts of the day in Dublin; mornings tend to be lackluster affairs. The city abounds with pubs, virtually all of which boast some literary connection or another, and restaurants, which vary from the frankly awful to the absolutely delightful. One of the city’s less-endearing attributes is the state of its public transport system. There is a fairly efficient rapid transit light railway from the city center to the suburbs, but the bus service is dismal and taxis are rarer than hens’ teeth. Dublin is a city made for walking. Visitors with a spare hour or so can make the journey outside the city and there are any number of attractions near the capital. Not least, there are nearly 30 golf courses within 15 minutes’ drive and several racetracks less than an hour away. Dublin is a quirky and occasionally eccentric city, with a decidedly leisurely approach to life that belies its business and financial sharpness.
The message is that if you’re looking for substantial fund interest in your stock, then Dublin is probably not the right place to put on a major presentation. On the other hand, if you fancy spending some time in one of Europe’s most enjoyable cities and meeting a good bunch of entertaining characters, a trip to Dublin is a must – and, you never know, you could well pick up a handful of new investors.
Top 5 Fund Management Institutions
(In alphabetical order) Bank of Ireland Asset Management
IG International Management
Irish Life Investment Managers
New Ireland Investment Managers
Ulster Bank Investment Managers
Source: Technimetrics Inc
Tourist InformationWHERE TO PRESENT
Berkeley Court Hotel Lansdowne Road Dublin 4
Tel: +353 1 660 1711
Fax: +353 1 661 7238
Conrad International
Earlsfort Terrace Dublin 2
Tel: +353 1 676 5555
Fax: +353 1 676 5424
Westbury Hotel
Grafton Street Dublin 2
Tel: +353 1 679 1122
Fax: +353 1 679 7078
Newman House
St Stephen’s Green Dublin 2
Tel: +353 1 706 7422
Fax: +353 1 706 7211
WHERE TO STAYShelbourne Hotel
St Stephen’s Green Dublin 2
Tel: +353 1 676 6471
Fax: +353 1 661 6006
Gresham Hotel
O’Connell Street Dublin 1
Tel: +353 1 874 6881
Fax: +353 1 878 7175
Berkeley Court Hotel
Lansdowne Road Dublin 4
Tel: +353 1 660 1711
Fax: +353 1 661 7238
Conrad International
Earlsfort Terrace Dublin 2
Tel: +353 1 676 5555
Fax: +353 1 676 5424
Westbury Hotel
Grafton Street Dublin 2
Tel: +353 1 679 1122
Fax: +353 1 679 7078
WHERE TO EAT
Patrick Guilbaud
46 St James’ Place Dublin 2
Tel: +353 1 676 4192
Fax: +353 1 661 0052
The Commons
St Stephen’s Green Dublin 2
Tel: +353 1 475 2597
Fax: +353 1 478 0551
Peacock Alley
47 South William Street Dublin 2
Tel: +353 1 677 0708
Fax: +353 1 671 8854
Le Coq Hardi
35 Pembroke Road Dublin 4
Tel: +353 1 668 9070
Fax: +353 1 668 9887
WHERE TO GO
Temple Bar
Dublin’s burgeoning artistic, cultural and restaurant quarter, a maelstrom of bars, little shops and small theatres.
Dublin Writers Museum
Parnell Square, Dublin
An elegant Georgian house with a rich display of Ireland’s literary heritage; nearby is the James Joyce Centre.
National Gallery of Ireland
Merrion Square West Dublin 2
National Library of Ireland
Kildare Street
A splendid permanent collection of books, prints, maps and drawings.
