The Prague Stock Exchange will launch trading of a new issue of Stock Spirits Group PLC starting from 23 October 2013. The issue will be traded on the START unregulated market under the STOCK title (ISIN GB00BF5SDZ96). Liquidity support will be provided by the trading members of the Exchange, Česká spořitelna, Patria Finance. Shares Begin trading in London today. IPO price was set to 235p from initial price range of 210-260p.
The shares of Stock Spirits begin trading at price which will be set based on the closing price of the issue reached on (16,54 GBP, 0,43%) within the first trading day. As of 23 December 2013, the issue will also be included in the PX index as part of the regular update.
The issue is launched on the unregulated market because the current EU legislation practically prevents the listing of stock on the regulated market without the issuer’s knowledge. It will only be possible to transfer the issue to the regulated market after the expiry of an 18-month period. “The reason we decided to trade Stock Spirits on the Prague Stock Exchange is that there is demand for this issue among local investors who wish to be able to trade it in CZK and with active liquidity support provided by our members. Unfortunately, the issuer’s decision to list the stocks only in London disqualifies these investors. We therefore tried to find a way to enable local investors to trade the issue, even at the cost of not being able to trade it within the regulated market from the very beginning, but only the unregulated market”, said Petr Koblic, CEO of the CEE Stock Exchange Group and the Prague Stock Exchange.
In order to be able to successfully trade the issue on the Prague Stock Exchange, it was necessary to secure a sufficient quantity of the securities for trading. This has been arranged by the trading member who has formally introduced the issue on the market, i.e. Česká spořitelna and Patria Finance, who will act as so-called Patrons of the issue.
“It will be relatively difficult to start up the trading in Prague because a special tax entitled Stamp Duty applies on UK shares settled outside the territory of the UK, which considerably affects the possibility of the effective trading of British based companies outside of the UK. However, I firmly believe that we will finally succeed, such as we did with the issue of (27,95 CZK, -2,95%), where immediately after the listing the trading volume ratio was 80/20 to the detriment of Prague and now the ratio has practically turned around, to approximately 70/30 in favour of the Prague Stock Exchange”, said Petr Koblic.