Where Have All the London IPOs Gone?
On this mini-documentary from Bloomberg Originals, we explore the reasons for a storied stock market’s retreat and what it’s doing to turn things around.
Illustration: Christian Capestany
In September, London fell out of the world’s top 20 ranking of global initial public offering markets, with fundraising volume at its lowest in decades. The demotion was the latest blow to the City’s beleaguered exchange, which has seen smaller valuations, weak liquidity and a dearth of big-ticket listings, posing a problem for the government, investors and ordinary people alike.
The crisis has been decades in the making, with UK companies consistently trading at a discount to their peers elsewhere. Recently, a number of high-profile companies decamped for exchanges in the US and Germany, including microchip designer Arm and money-transfer firm Wise. In September, drug giant AstraZeneca—the UK’s most valuable company—announced a plan for a direct listing of ordinary shares in New York. There are many reasons why Europe’s biggest equity market has lost its luster. In this mini-documentary, we explain what they are and what’s being done to turn things around.