An Empirical Study On The Evolution Of The Global Financial Centers

London and New York have so far come into the highest stage of the evolution of international financial center(IFC) with the Global Financial Centers (GFC) established in these two first-class IFCs. We can draw some implications for China's IFC building from examining the evolution of the two GFCs.Previously, the majority of the IFC studies focused on the theoretical analysis of IFC evolution from the perspective of financial institution and financial activities' agglomeration. While there are some empirical reports, these quantitative researches are too simple to reveal the law of evolution. In this paper, Firstly, taking some quantitative researches as our reference, I establish a variable system of developmental level indices and determinants indices. Secondly, based on the economic and financial data from 1980 to 2006 of New York, London and their home country, I describe the development and determinants of the two GFCs' financial markets. Lastly, in section 4 of chapter 3 and chapter 4, I examine the evolution process of two GFCs in the last three decades through the cointegration analysis model. The results indicate some certain determinants tend to affect the GFC evolution, such as economic growth, scale of international trade, labor productivity, capital yield, government regulation and so on.In chapter 5, from the perspective of capital import and export, I conclude a three-phase theory about IFC evolution, which is exemplified by the evolution process of London and New York since the 18th century. Specifically, the IFC evolution can be divided into three stages, a financial center must become a domestic financial center which is characterized by domestic funds utilized by domestic industries in the early stage, and then evolve into the next stage, which is character- ized by the export of domestic capital and financial service. In the highest stage, some IFCs turn into the GFC, such as London GFC, which is characterized by foreign capital utilized by international institution, and New York GFC, which is characterized by foreign capital utilized by domestic economy.In the last two sections of chapter 5, on the basis of financial data and marcoeconomic data from 1980 to 2006 of New York, London and Tokyo, I make multiple panel data analyses through Fixed-Effect Model. The one aims to seek the relevance between GFC developmental level and its determinants, the other aims to seek the relevance between developmental level and national welfare of host country. The former examination indicates some certain determinants tend to affect the IFC evolution, which include domestic economic condition, such as economic growth, labor cost, tax system, interest rate, saving rate, government regulation, and international economic condition, such as international trade volume, international capital volume, opening level of financial market, international regulation level and so on. The latter examination indicates, the IFC evolution, especially the development in banking of IFC, is beneficial to domestic inhabitant's income level, consumption level and state revenue, and thus to promote national welfare of host country. However, the IFC evolution is unhelpful to reduce domestic unemployment.