While several European cities have said they have attracted significant numbers of financial sector workers as banks prepare plans for Britain after Brexit, an industry group in Paris has claimed that the French capital is the most popular destination.

Gerard Mestrallet, president of the lobby group Paris Europlace, said at the opening of the group’s annual conference that Paris expects to create about 3,500 finance and banking jobs.

The figure “is much higher than the direct job transfers to other European financial capitals,” he told The Local.

Meanwhile, US asset management giant Blackrock and Citigroup are among the companies planning to move some operations to Paris, according to British media reports.

Mestrallet claimed that transfers from London could generate an additional 20,000 indirect jobs. He credited President Emmanuel Macron, who, he said, has succeeded in making labour laws less restrictive for employers. “We’ve made more progress in the past two years in Paris than over the previous 13 years,” he said, citing the end of a wealth tax on financial assets and a new flat tax on capital income, including dividends and interest payouts.

Rivals for post-Brexit financial activities include Frankfurt, Amsterdam and Dublin.