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Paradoxically it was because there was exchange control. As a result of the Exchange Control Act, the Bank [of England ] could allow traffic in foreign currency securities on its capital market, and activity in foreign currencies, because it was completely isolated from the management of the domestic currency mass.ssss1

For the first Eurobond issue out of London to take place, however, there was a myriad of legal, regulatory and tax issues to overcome. The firm that led the way on this was SG Warburg.

SG Warburg had been founded in London in 1936 by Siegmund Warburg, a scion of the German-Jewish banking dynasty who had fled from Hamburg to Britain after Hitler had come to power. The company was originally named New Trading Company, or ‘Nutraco’, and began by financing the growth of small businesses and offering corporate finance advice. In its early years, it comprised a small group of German-Jewish émigrés, whose leading members were known as the ‘Uncles’. The company's internal language was German and, in the German tradition, the Uncles were extremely formal, addressing each other by their last names even after decades of close acquaintance. SG Warburg was not among the leading City firms, but in 1956 acquired a small merchant bank, Seligman Brothers, through which it became an Accepting House recognised by the Bank of England and gradually made a name for itself over the following decade.