Battle for the global elite: Paris and London’s wealth loss is Dubai’s gain

Paris. Cafes are bustling, the economy is showing signs of improvement and a shiny (stair-free) metro expansion is making the 15-minute city even more accessible. Yet there’s also the faintly audible sound of wealth on the move: Two locals inform me of plans to leave, one to Dubai and the other to Switzerland.
In a similar vein to London’s fleeing non-doms and Brexit banking exiles, Paris is going through its own dose of ras-le-bol fiscal — the moment when the proverbial tax straw breaks the camel’s back — in President Emmanuel Macron’s twilight years. Taxes are going up on big business and the wealthy; Marine Le Pen is the presidential contender to beat in 2027; parliament is gridlocked and still fighting over pension reforms that tore the country apart in 2023. After an extraordinary run for Paris as the euro area’s investment-banking hub of choice, with the number of French financiers on seven-figure salaries almost doubling in four years, hiring plans are being put on ice.

What you might call “peak Paris” marks a new phase in the fight for global talent — one in which Europe is on the back foot. Paris won the Brexit battle for corporate and investment bankers thanks to tax incentives and pro-business reforms, JPMorgan Chase & Co.’s France chief Kyril Courboin told a Bloomberg conference last week, pointing to his own firm’s expanded French footprint to 950 staff from 230 a decade ago. However, the war for private equity and hedge funds is being lost to centers beyond the Paris-London commuter belt like Dubai,