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Reuters (31 January 2017)

The head of the Irish central bank said on Tuesday that there will not be a "new London" in the European Union after Britain votes to leave the bloc.

Philip Lane, who is also a member of the European Central Bank's Governing Council, said Europe's future financial centers may be more fragmented geographically, even if they were integrated as part of a single market.

Cities around Europe are already vying for the potential new business, including financial centers in Germany, France, the Netherlands, Luxembourg and Ireland.

"There is not going to be any new London in the EU 27. History happened in a certain way. You can't just lift institutions and drop then somewhere else," Lane said at an event hosted by the London Irish business society in London.

"You may well have this fragmented but integrated financial system so location X has a cluster of derivatives trading, location Z has a cluster of insurance etc."

(Reporting by John Geddie; Editing by David Milliken)