Aim, London’s junior market, has fewer new members and a paucity of fundraising. There have been only 26 new listings from foreign companies so far this year, and in October no new money was raised. For the first time in its 13-year history, the number of quoted companies in the lightly regulated market is falling. Trading volumes have slipped and market values have collapsed. Is investors’ flight to safety turning what was once seen as the Wild West of shareholding into a ghost town?

The market is out of tune with the times. Investors are put off by the feather-light regulation that made Aim the location of choice for companies around the world that wanted to raise funds without too onerous or expensive listing standards. When institutions find that even blue-chip companies are losing their appeal, smaller and less transparent groups will not tempt them.