does where my domain is registered effect local search rankings?

[kads]

say I have my domain registered in australia or the uk, will this affect my US or global search rankings?

Or is it where the HOSTING of the website is that determines the geo-location of the site?

I ask since some overseas hosts seem to be pretty good, and I want to spread risk by registering in different places.

thanks in advance

[phranque]

this might be a good place to start.
Official Google Webmaster Central Blog: Working with multi-regional websites:
http://googlewebmastercentral.blogspot.com/2010/03/working-with-multi-regional-websites.html [googlewebmastercentral.blogspot.com]

[caz338]

From what I've read, it seems that if you want to rank higher locally, its good if your site is hosted around that area.

Same idea goes for the domain name. So yes it affects it your ranking.