Taking over Europe
THE best eve-of-battle course for our troops, and certainly the best tonic for their nerves, was to be found in (of all places) Florence. There, last week, the financial analysts of Europe gathered for their two-yearly meeting, in an evident mood of fascination and fright, directed towards London. It is true that the Florentine bankers have been nervous of British risks ever since they were let down by King Edward III. (They rightly thought that he would win the Crecy and Poitiers campaigns, thus gaining the means to pay them, but wrongly thought that, having the means, he would pay.) What was new was to find that London firms' fear of the Americans and the Japanese is nothing to the continental markets' fear of London. Businesses the size of Philips or Volvo have outgrown their domestic stock mar- kets just as they have outgrown their domestic consumer markets. They are used to tapping the financial markets of the world. Investment bankers and brokers see a bogy — that the main market in these big
companies' stock will move to London, to those (Japanese and American houses cer- tainly included) who can offer quick and cheap dealing and access to investors from Tokyo to Malibu. Local markets will be left with the penny-ante stocks, and can kiss their blue chips goodbye. I do not believe that it will be as straightforward as that, on either side of the account, for London. Florence seemed to be full of shrewd Swedes and Swiss with access to any amount of stock which they would be delighted to sell to the Anglo-Saxons as an alternative to setting the certificates on fire and claiming the insurance. Never under- estimate, in these investment internation- als, the advantage of playing at home.
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