The financial centre trifecta I almost won

I’VE had the great privilege of living and working in two great cities, New York and London. And for a few tantalising months, a third seemed a possibility: Tokyo. That would have won me a kind of career trifecta: Residing in the three great financial centres of our age.

But it wasn’t to be. In late 2020, just after I’d gotten all the necessary visas, the Delta variant of Covid-19 surged. That led Japan to shut itself off from all new visitors and would-be residents, a prohibition that didn’t end till October 2022. So I reconciled myself to London – where I am now – and New York – where I keep an apartment – not bad places to call home.

I’ve since been to Japan’s capital twice for a couple of weeks each visit – and I’ve tried to imagine my unlived life in the world’s most populous metropolis. Here’s my personal scorecard for the cities, albeit an imbalanced one, given I lived four decades in New York, close to seven years in London and have only been in Tokyo for the equivalent of a month. Anyway, I think I’ve kept the sour grapes to a small squish.