Canada and the International System of Bank Headquarters Cities, 1968–1989

Abstract

ABSTRACT This paper examines spatial‐temporal trends in the international system of corporate banking centers. It is evident that the largest corporations locate their headquarters in a formal national decision‐making hierarchy and that national and regional nodes within this hierarchy house the headquarters of major banks. Initially these banks link clients internally. However, as domestic corporations evolve into transnationals, banks follow their customers overseas and establish foreign headquarters. The results of the study indicate that, until 1975, American banking corporations and their financial centers dominated global banking. Since then other countries, most notably Japan and Germany, have successfully challenged this hegemony, while others like the United Kingdom and Canada have been in relative decline. The 1980s witnessed a new era of international coordination of the world's largest industrial countries. Canada, for example, opened its doors to international banking, joined the G‐7, and presently is linked to the world's major banking centers.