Brexit would be disastrous for capital markets, says Standard Life chief

“This would be a shock that would register about 15 on the Richter scale,” said Standard Life Investments chief executive Keith Skeoch, referring to the possibility that the British might vote to leave the EU in a referendum due by the end of 2017.

The City of London is the bloc’s biggest financial centre and regarded as core to pan-EU plans for a capital markets union.

Mr Skeoch will take over as chief executive of Standard Life, the Edinburgh-headquartered insurer and asset manager, later this year.

Insurers and pension funds have stepped into a vacuum left by banks after the global financial crisis, investing in infrastructure either directly or through capital markets.

Mr Skeoch said investors needed to feel confident that capital markets structures would not change over the lifetime of these long-term instruments.

“You want to make sure the rights you have today will persist for the next 20-30 years. If you talk to institutional investors, one of the problems is those sands shift - they can’t be allowed to.”