> build a better model with lower latency.

That's mighty impossible for the european mindset - people here are not so risk-eager as to through hundreds of billions on infrastructure for something that might return a profit.

The US capital markets are truly a wonder to behold. There's no way to replace that. For good and ill, you'd only get weird looks in Europe if you asked for €10 billion for an unproven business model in what's somehow also a competitive market.

To be fair this example does look a lot like insanity.

This is part of the answer.

I have a theory about the second part; European consumers have an even more suspicious view of "corporate overlords" if they are domestic/European than if they are American. Not because Americans are more trustworthy, but because they see Europeans as "anonymous masses" and are therefore more "neutral" to the internal struggles in Europe.

Signing up to a service owned by a European "dynastic" family, possibly in a neighbouring country, feels like more of a surrender of autonomy.

You don't have to love risk to build something you need.