The new edition of New York Magazine asks, is New York falling behind London?

As I wrote over in Syntagma, “Certainly the City — London’s world-class financial centre — is much more vibrant than Wall Street, which is suffering the dead hand of Sarbanes-Oxley regulation. The light-touch, principle-based system of the Square Mile knocks spots off New York’s draconian regime. This, almost alone, allowed the London Stock Exchange to survive a ferocious takeover bid from New York’s Nasdaq recently, simply by pointing out to shareholders that it was in a much better financial position than the American exchange. That kind of insouciance can’t be bought, only built. Very English.”

The magazine also asks, Are we no longer the world’s financial capital?