Advanced producer services have long been theorized as pivotal in organizing the global economy. Finance takes centre stage in the advanced producer services complex as orchestrator of global flows, particularly in underwriting investment and evaluating corporate performance. The ascent of financialized globalization raises the suspicion that key advanced producer services act as rent-extracting ‘obligatory passage points’ in the orchestration of global financial flows. Competition within the financial sector is contentious given the sustained profits by globally connected banks operating in concentrated markets. Investment banks and other advanced producer services play key roles in underwriting of securities, raising questions whether underwriting is a competitive process. This paper interrogates the microeconomic foundations for the role of investment banks in investment chains to shed light on their rent extraction practices. Using a sample of 2940 initial public offerings for the USA, Canada, and Europe in the 1998–2017 period, we examine the structure of fees charged by investment banks for underwriting of equity securities. Our results are consistent with the proposition that investment banks with more market power and stronger network ties with institutional investors utilize their dominant position in the marketplace to extract rents from both issuers and institutional investors. Taken together, at times of spatial and sectoral consolidation, these results show compelling evidence for the status of investment banks and by extension the wider advanced producer services complex as obligatory passage points under financialized globalization.

长期以来，先进的生产者服务一直被认为是组织全球经济的关键。在全球生产流程的协调者中，财务在高级生产者服务中心中占据着中心位置，尤其是在承销投资和评估公司绩效方面。金融化的上升全球化令人怀疑，关键的先进生产者服务在全球金融流程的编排中充当了提取租金的“强制性通过点”。鉴于在集中市场运营的全球关联银行的持续利润，金融领域的竞争存在争议。投资银行和其他先进的生产者服务在证券承销中扮演着关键角色，这使人们质疑承销是否是一个竞争过程。本文探讨了投资银行在投资链中的作用的微观经济基础，以阐明其租金提取方法。我们使用1998年至2017年期间在美国，加拿大和欧洲进行的2940次首次公开发行的样本，我们研究了投资银行收取的股票证券承销费用的结构。我们的结果与这样的命题一致，即具有更大市场力量和与机构投资者的网络联系更紧密的投资银行利用其在市场中的主导地位从发行人和机构投资者那里获取租金。综上所述，在空间和部门合并时，这些结果显示出令人信服的证据，证明了投资银行的地位，并由此扩展了更广泛的先进生产者服务综合体，将其作为金融全球化下的强制性通过点。