Victorian Plumbing’s IPO pushes market activity to historic levels
Listing activity on the London markets has maintained the momentum witnessed in the previous two quarters with another strong quarterly performance on both the Main Market and AIM.
That’s according to EY’s latest market tracker IPO Eye.
The Main market hosted 10 IPOs, raising £3.1bn and a further 13 companies were admitted to AIM raising £664m.
Funds raised in the first half of the year totalled £9.4bn, making 2021 the best half year IPO fundraising performance since H1 2014.
Q2 AIM activity returned to historical quarterly levels, helped by its biggest ever listing with Formby-headquartered online bathroom supplier Victorian Plumbing Group plc raising £298m and being admitted to trading with a market capitalisation of £850m.
Across both markets listing activity in the quarter has been driven by the technology sector and tech enabled businesses, together with strong performances from healthcare and life sciences.
Cross border listing activity has continued, with five international issuers seeking to list in London, and the UK has retained its position as the leading European IPO venue by funds raised. Globally it is third place behind the US and China for funds raised via IPO.
It has also been a strong quarter for follow on fundraising by existing issuers with over £9bn being raised in the quarter, again ahead of other European markets, with a total of £27bn of equity capital being raised in London in the first half of the year.
Mark Clephan, EY
Mark Clephan, Partner for EY’s North Corporate Finance Team, said: “This is the third busy quarter in a row for the UK markets, with high levels of activity on both the Main Market and AIM and there appears to be no let-up in activity in sight for the remainder of 2021.
“Whilst activity in the tech sector has dominated listings in recent quarters, we are starting to see companies from more traditional sectors consider a return to the public markets as the wider economy recovers from the shock of COVID-19 and this should increase overall deal volumes.
“As ever, investors will continue to scrutinise potential issuers with business models, governance and ESG playing a key role in the investment decision.”
