New York, Hong Kong: The US has strengthened its position as the preferred destination for initial public offerings, and is set to rank as the top country for new equity fundraisings for the fourth straight year, following the recent blockbuster listing of Chinese e-commerce group Alibaba.

In the year to date, companies have raised $77 billion through listings on the New York Stock Exchange and Nasdaq, according to data from Dealogic — twice as much as the amount raised in London and Hong Kong combined.

IPOs on US exchanges have accounted for two out of every five dollars raised so far in 2014, the figures show. Some $25 billion of the US total has come from Alibaba, which earlier this month completed the largest IPO ever.

This surge in US listings has accompanied quickening US economic activity and near record highs for the S&P 500 and Dow Jones Industrial Average. Global listings in New York are running at the fastest pace by deal value since 2000 — lifted in part, bankers and lawyers say, by the sheer number of US investors.

“There is a depth of liquidity [in the US] ... that kind of depth of potential investment is just not available on other exchanges,” said Nick Kronfeld, a partner at Davis Polk. “[Listing in the US] opens to companies a whole range of institutions that aren’t there in other markets.”

While New York and Hong Kong remain neck and neck in terms of number of cross border deals this year, foreign-domiciled companies have raised far more money through IPOs in New York.

Excluding Alibaba, international companies raised $11.4 billion through US listings, led by Chinese internet, and Israeli and British technology groups, according to Ipreo, the market data firm. Foreign companies listing in Hong Kong, in contrast, raised $3 billion.

In May, JD.com, the Chinese internet company, raised $2 billion through a Nasdaq-listed IPO, which was followed a month later by the debut of Markit, the London-based financial data company, on the same exchange. Proceeds from Markit’s offering eclipsed $1.4 billion.

“Flexibility around governance provisions and the reputation for US capital markets as a whole — that environment has made the NYSE a premier place to list,” said Stephen Roti, head of equity capital markets at Nomura.

Hong Kong had dominated the global IPO market in both 2009 and 2010, thanks to a wave of major listings from Chinese state-owned enterprises, principally banks. Before Alibaba, the two largest ever flotations were from Chinese state lenders — ICBC and Agricultural Bank of China.

But that flood has since turned to a trickle, with most of the biggest and best of China’s state-owned companies now listed, and few privately-run companies yet ready to pick up the slack.

The one exception was Alibaba, but its decision to leave board nominations in the hands of a small group of company executives failed to satisfy Hong Kong listing rules.

The fall down the league tables meant that Alibaba’s decision to list in New York — rather than alter its management structure — sparked a fierce debate within Hong Kong’s financial establishment about whether to relax its listing rules.

But now the city is gripped by the excitement of an entirely different venture — the Hong Kong-Shanghai stock connect.

The scheme — due to launch next month — will allow mainland Chinese investors to buy Hong Kong shares directly, and give global fund managers far easier access to Shanghai-listed stocks.

“Clearly there will be a benefit to having a real onshore, domestic presence in Shanghai, and certainly the exchange will benefit,” Roti says. “But is that really going to be a definitive factor for people, my guess is no.”

In the US, bankers expect a busy autumn and winter as companies who waited for Alibaba to complete its listing file plans to offer shares.

— Financial Times