This year, 88 companies delisted or transferred their primary listing away from the London Stock Exchange. Only 18 new companies listed. This, according to FT, marks the biggest net outflow of companies since the financial crisis.

A lot of these companies are, of course, moving their listings over to the US. The New York Stock Exchange and the Nasdaq are, by far, the two largest stock exchanges in the world by market cap. And so many companies believe that they'll generally have a better time being listed over there -- better access to capital, greater liquidity, etc.

This is not a new trend. Last year, the FT also called out the London Stock Exchange as being the European stock exchange with the greatest risk of seeing companies depart for the US. Here's what's been happening since the financial crisis:

Some people may not think that this is a big deal, but it certainly undermines London's position as a pre-eminent global center. Most rankings of the world's best or most global cities have London and New York out front. But from an economic prosperity standpoint, the US hegemony is real and feels even stronger right now.

Naturally, this decline will also trickle through other parts of the economy. On the real estate side, prime central London is seeing the biggest buyer's market since the financial crisis. (Presumably this is true of other submarkets as well.) On the new construction side, sales and starts are falling, and unsold homes sitting as developer inventory are increasing:

It is tempting to say that London will always be London. But:

“The UK market does not have any god-given right to be a leading listing venue, [but] it requires nurturing and support to be successful in a market that is increasingly global,” said Hall, adding that “more companies will depart” unless action is taken.

This is true of every city and every industry. There are no guarantees. Cities need to compete, just as companies compete. I am also of the opinion that Brexit has and will continue to be a drag on the UK economy. Disclaimer: I'm not an economist. But the UK is a relatively small country. So intuitively, I would think that the way to compete with the scale and dominance of the US is through a more unified Europe.

Are you bullish or bearish on London right now?

"...the pandemic and its aftermath have also created a rare openness to doing things differently. Seizing this opportunity won’t be easy, or a short-term affair. But if we can be certain of anything, it’s that cities will adapt and evolve, and that they have the potential to come back stronger."

- Kearney 2020 Global Cities Report

The Kearney 2020 Global Cities Report is out and it incorporates two main rankings: their Global Cities Index (GCI) and their Global Cities Outlook (GCO).

The former is intended to be a snapshot of where things stand today and the latter is intended to be a forecast of where things might be heading.

Here's their GCI:

And here's their GCO:

Note: The big mover in their GCO is Toronto, jumping nine spots to take second place behind London.

The full report can be downloaded over here.

At the beginning of this year (which seems like eons ago), I wrote about a CityLab series that Feargus O'Sullivan was doing on the vernacular home designs of a handful of European cities. Cities like London and Berlin.

Well, after a brief pause, that series is back in the form of a CityLab "storythread." It's now called, "The Iconic Home Designs That Define Our Global Cities." In it, he explores the various floor plans, housing typologies, and tenures that you might find around the world. Everywhere from from Singapore to Reykjavik.

The most recent article is all about Prague's communist-era apartments. Apparently people call these paneláks because they were initially built using some sort of collection of prefabricated panels. They were a quick and dirty housing solution for a city and country that were rapidly urbanizing starting in the late 1950s. (See, prefab works.)

But what I find most interesting about the story of these paneláks is how their reputation seems to have changed and evolved over time. They proved to be a far more adaptable form of housing than you might initially think, going from written off and ready for demolition, in some cases, to then becoming a form of aspirational housing.

Part of this allegedly had to do with a handover from state ownership to private ownership, which maybe goes to show you that architecture and design, alone, aren't enough when it comes to housing innovation. You really need to consider the whole picture.

But regardless, it is clear to me that tastes do change, and housing is no exception. Renewal is an integral part of urban life. And one generation's trash might be another generation's treasure.

Photo by Jakub Matyáš on Unsplash