On 8 January 2010, PwC has published the Q4 2009 IPO Watch Europe report. The IPO Watch Europe surveys all new primary market equity IPOs on Europe’s principal stock markets and market segments (including exchanges in Austria, Belgium, Denmark, France, Germany, Greece, Holland, Ireland, Italy, Luxembourg, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland and the UK).
Europe’s IPO markets recorded a distinct upturn in activity in the fourth quarter of 2009, with both value and volume rising markedly over the previous nine months when stock exchanges continued to suffer from the worldwide loss of confidence in the capital markets and the recession. However, pricing proved difficult in what remains a buyers market.
There were 61 IPOs on European exchanges in the last quarter of 2009 with an offering value of €4,994m, compared with 44 listings that raised €1,375m in the previous quarter and the 64 IPOs with a value of €1,238m that were recorded in the final three months of 2008.
NYSE Euronext led on IPO value with 13 IPOs raising €1,907m (in the same quarter of 2008, it had an equal number of IPOs but they raised just €6m) followed by the Warsaw Stock Exchange (WSE) with 16 IPOs valued at €1,454m (compared to 23 lPOs a year ago, raising €555m). London was in an unaccustomed third place with 14 listings raising €951m (two more than in Q4 2008 with a value of €666m). Nine of the London IPOs were on its AIM market and raised €388m, the same number it saw in Q4 2008 with a total value then of just €3m. The remaining listings were on the Main Market and raised €563m.
Warsaw recorded the biggest IPO of the quarter, the Polish energy company, Polska Grupa Energetyczna which raised €1,407m, followed by the Dutch insurance company Delta Lloyd which listed on NYSE Euronext and raised €1,016m. The third largest, also on NYSE Euronext, was the French industrial goods company CFAO, which raised €806m, while London hosted the fourth biggest IPO, that of investment company Gartmore Group, raising €378m.
For further details, read the IPO Watch Europe Survey Q4 2009 from our UK colleagues.
IPO Watch Q4 2009 full report