One of Britain’s most valuable private companies will not necessarily choose London when it comes time for its initial public offering, its chief executive told Semafor in an interview.
The remarks by Greg Jackson — the founder and chief executive of Octopus Energy, the country’s largest electricity supplier — pile further pressure on the British capital’s premier stock exchange, which has seen a series of companies either opt to publicly list in New York or threaten to do so. And they come as Britain itself is embroiled in a general election campaign where the opposition Labour Party, which is widely expected to win the July 4 poll, has actively courted London’s financial sector to present itself as a responsible steward of the country’s economy.
“If we ever were to IPO, it’s not obvious it will be London,” Jackson said. He pointed in particular to UK funds having less money to invest than their US peers, leaving London-listed companies undervalued relative to their New York peers, and noted that investment banks in London had fewer analysts focused on companies like Octopus, which turns off potential investors.
London has for years been fighting a mostly losing battle in its global competition with New York for retaining big-name listings: Last year, the chip design firm Arm — headquartered in Cambridge, England — opted to list on the New York Stock Exchange, major companies like Flutter (which owns the gambling site FanDuel) and CRH have dropped their London listings in favor of New York, and the oil and gas giant Shell has publicly suggested it may follow suit.
Asked whether he’d consider a New York listing instead, Jackson said simply: “I can just say, it’s not obvious it would be London.”
