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Comment by sajithdilshan | Hacker News Reader

What do you mean for now? There is no other alternative in continental Europe due to language barrier

Why would language matter?

Anyway, Frankfurt is the next biggest financial center after London, and it tend to get the business when a firm wants to move out of London .

When it comes to being a financial hub English as a global language is paramount in modern world. You wouldn't expect a C-level executive from other side of the world to speak German. Further, if you've ever been in the financial scene in Frankfurt, it's unfortunately predominantly in German because most of the old people working in the institutions can only speak vacation English and they switch to German as soon possible.

Also from where did you hear that Frankfurt gets the business that's leaving London? What is your source? That was the hope for the Germans with the Brexit, but it never happened. German laws and bureaucracy is still far too hostile and outdated compared to London.

>most of the old people working in the institutions

A problem that will solve itself within the next few years

Agree, the younger generation, or at least every young German (mostly millennials/GenZ) I’ve met is completely fluent in English, almost like native English speakers.

Some even with an American accent which they picked up by watching YouTube videos

Yes but we Germans are too stuck up with our language barriers.

And fax machines. Don't forget the fax machines.

This post is weird. Finance people who work in Frankfurt and Amsterdam certainly speak English. Yes, they will also speak German, Dutch, and a variety of other langauges, but not speaking English is not the blocker here. I will also say that finance people in Paris under 40 are also (mostly) fluent in English. (Please don't bring up accent; no one in finance cares about your accent when speaking English; they care about your prices.)

Why are you excluding Ireland?

Ireland is a tax-haven, not a financial hub.

Euronext collectively is big, but Euronext Dublin is about 1/27th the size of LSE by its own market cap.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Euronext_Dublin

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/London_Stock_Exchange

That said, I'm not entirely clear how the exchange's market cap should or shouldn't be thought of in terms of the total market cap of assets that the exchange lets you trade. Or indeed the float of those assets, which is a concept I've only learned about due to SpaceX's nonsense IPO, so take my thoughts with an appropriate pinch of salt.

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