Compliance costs and regulatory requirements of SOX are delivering big opportunites for the London Stock exchange which has reported a record 129 international companies from 29 countries listing there, up 82 per cent on 2004.

The London Stock Exchange says just about all the companies are blaming Sarbanes-Oxley. The LSE press release says: "Of those companies that considered listing on an US exchange, 90 per cent felt that the demands of Sarbanes Oxley made listing in London more attractive. More than half of the international companies appointed a UK based non-executive director in preparation for their London listing."

According to a piece written by attorney Tommy Sangchompuphen in Law.Com, foreign private issuers face unique challenges and of course, compliance costs in the US. Howard Jiang, a partner at law firm Baker & McKenzie said: "The problem with smaller companies is that they don't have large amounts of human resources. It is an uphill struggle for these companies because finding the right people, qualified people, and then paying these people, can be a challenge for overseas companies who are not familiar with our situation and why SOX was enacted."

With these sorts of constraints, markets like London have a competitive advantage. Japan, Hong Kong and Korea are looking good too.

Still, let's get this into perspective. The New York Stock Exchange is as powerful as ever, and if the scuttlebutt in London is anything to go by, there's talk that the NYSE is keeping an eye on Australian investment bank Macquarie's hostile takeover bid for the LSE. There's a hot rumour that the NYSE will come in as a white knight.

Still, the increase in London listings would have regulators there worried. The Financial Reporting Council is concerned about new rules coming out of Europe that would require it to monitor audits of non-European companies listing in Britain. FRC chief executive Paul Boyle says he is not sure how they'll cope with the monster workload. One that SOX helped produce.