NY‐LON 2020: the changing relations between London and New York in corporate globalisation

London and New York are the leading cities in the world of corporate globalisation: their financial, professional, and creative services are at the centre of the commercial connections that constitute the world city network. The relations between the two cities are more complementary than competitive, commonly indicated by the concept of NY-LON as a trans-oceanic service conglomerate for facilitating economic globalisation. However, world city network analysis shows London growing its overall servicing connectivity more than New York. This change in the inter-city relation is investigated through focus on the service connectivity and agglomeration capacities of the two cities. It is found that they share a very similar connectivity regional profile while simultaneously showing stark differences in their service agglomeration sector profiles. This is shown to be the result of London gaining the rapidly growing super-rich servicing market. Thus while New York continues its long-term production of financial innovations, London has grown an offshore platform for global capital specifically in the form of the world’s money management centre.