“The markets are better”: Why YouGov is considering ditching London for New York
London’s embattled equity markets are at risk of another high-profile departure after YouGov’s boss said he was considering switching their listing to New York.
“I think the markets are better at supporting companies like ours there,” the data firm’s chief Stephan Shakespeare said in an interview with the FT.
Both shifting its listing in full, or creating a secondary listing as Flutter are in the process of doing, are on the table.
It would be the latest blow to London’s reputation as a listings hub, an anxiety kicked into higher gear by British tech darling Arm’s decision to list on Wall Street.
A host of other London-listed firms have also been hit by take-private offers, with UK equities still running at a price-to-earnings discount compared to US peers.
YouGov makes more money in the US than in the UK.
The firm, run by Morning Wire columnist Shakespeare, provides data intelligence, polling and market research to the world’s biggest brands.
The purchase of a German outfit last year had given YouGov the necessary scale to consider a stateside shift, Shakespeare said,
Moves are already in play to re-energise the capital’s equity markets.
A review of capital markets by then-Freshfields lawyer Mark Austin called for a series of reforms to listings rules, some of which are being consulted on by the financial watchdog, the FCA.
That followed another review of the capital’s global competitiveness led by Lord Hill.
“When I first started working on the Hill Review [of listing rules] in the final quarter of 2020, very often the response we got was ‘really? Reform? Do we need to?’ Now the conversation has completely moved on,” Austin told Morning Wire earlier this year.
YouGov’s share price is down around 8 per cent this year, but sits at around twice the value it had five years ago.