Almost a fifth of FTSE 100 chief executives live outside the UK, underlining the international make-up of the blue-chip index as London frets over the status of its stock market.
Nineteen chief executives running London’s largest listed companies live in locations ranging from the United Arab Emirates to Switzerland and Italy, according to an FT analysis of filings on Companies House.
The figures come as London battles to attract large new listings and to retain its current crop of companies after several high-profile defections.
Equipment rental group Ashtead, Paddy Power-owner Flutter and building materials company CRH are among the FTSE 100 groups to have moved their main listings to New York in recent years, while fintech Wise, which was not in the blue-chip index, decided to switch last year.
Carol Leonard, head of board practice at headhunter Inzito, said having bosses based outside Britain could make them less patriotic about keeping headquarters and company primary listings in the UK.
“It might make the leaders more logical and less emotional about where the entire business is based. The government needs to also understand that these global companies can now be moved at a whim,” she said.
Five FTSE 100 chiefs — including Barclays’ American chief executive CS Venkatakrishnan — have listed the US as their country of residence on Companies House.
Informa boss Stephen Carter hit the headlines last year after shifting his residency from the UK to the UAE, from where he now runs the data and events business.
Informa justified Carter’s move by highlighting the growth of its international businesses and a desire to expand in the Middle East. Several of its executives have moved to company offices overseas over the past 12 months.
Sunil Taldar, the chief executive of Airtel Africa, is also based in the UAE, as the London-listed telecoms business has a large office in Dubai while its operations are in Africa.
Headhunters say that where a chief executive spends the bulk of their time often indicates the market with the biggest influence on a company.
Leonard said that the trend of directors residing overseas reflected how heads of global businesses increasingly operated. “These men and women typically live on an aeroplane so they can be based anywhere. Their residence might be as much about where their family wants to live rather than where they do business.”
Omar Abbosh, who took over as chief executive of Pearson in 2024, resides in Italy despite growing up in the UK. Pearson said that Abbosh pays UK taxes on his salary but resides in Italy to be close to family in the area.
Luis Gallego, chief executive of British Airways-owner International Consolidated Airlines Group, splits his time between the UK and Spain but is a UK tax resident.
Elie Maalouf, chief executive of Intercontinental Hotels Group, lists the US as his country of residence on Companies House but the company said he divides his time between America and the UK and pays tax in both jurisdictions.
The changing composition of companies in the FTSE 100 and their chief executives means there is no reliable database showing the change over time in the number of bosses residing abroad.
However, another headhunter said that she believed there would inevitably be an increase in the number of bosses living abroad because of a wider push for boardroom diversity and a desire for directors with experience in overseas markets. These factors meant there had naturally been more international chief executives in recent years, the headhunter said.
A recent report by recruitment firm Spencer Stuart found that 21 per cent of FTSE 100 chairs and 36 per cent of CEOs are non-British nationals.
The trend was replicated across the boardroom with 37 per cent of 1,542 directors across FTSE boardrooms non-British nationals, which Spencer Stuart said marked a 54 per cent increase since 2010.
Chief executives of natural resource companies including Antofagasta, Rio Tinto and Fresnillo are based in the countries where they mainly operate. However, Endeavour Mining’s Ian Cockerill lives in Singapore, despite its focus on west Africa.
British companies are increasingly under investor scrutiny for handing chief executives generous relocation allowances to move to the UK.
Joshua Schulman, who took over as chief executive of Burberry in 2024 and has since overseen the luxury brand’s return to the FTSE 100, received £380,000 in house moving costs to help relocate from the US and is entitled to a further £325,000 housing allowance.
Fernando Fernandez was also awarded €657,174 in “relocation benefits” to switch from New York to London when taking the top job at Unilever last year.
Russ Mould, investment director at AJ Bell, said that chief executives’ overseas residence is a sign of flexibility “designed to help companies keep and attract the best talent. Uprooting families, especially children from education, could be a big deterrent to some moving to the UK. It may also simply make sense from an operational perspective, in terms of where the company’s customers are, or its key facilities.”
The international residence of a fifth of FTSE 100 chief executives is also likely to add weight to the argument that the blue-chip index is not an effective barometer of British business. More than 75 per cent of FTSE 100 company revenues are generated from outside the UK.
British boardrooms have also been under pressure to raise pay for chief executives to narrow the gap with higher paid US peers. Smith & Nephew’s chief executive Deepak Nath is based in the US, which helped the medical device maker justify his $7.8mn pay package in 2024 to rebellious shareholders on the basis that his remuneration had to be aligned to his American peers.
John Rogers, Smith & Nephew’s finance chief, has also recently relocated from the UK to the US, saying that he already spent a “significant amount of time” in the US. The company said at the time of Roberts’ move that it would allow better collaboration with US-based colleagues.
In some cases companies that have shifted their listings from London to New York have subsequently increased their bosses’ salaries. Ferguson’s Kevin Murphy has had his pay nearly double after the plumbing company moved its primary listing to New York in 2022. Flutter boss Peter Jackson’s total package almost trebled to more than $22mn from $7.8mn after switching the gambling firm’s primary listing to New York.