Revolut CEO blasts London Stock Exchange as ‘not rational,’ eyes US for IPO

[Deleted User]

Revolut CEO Nikolay Storonsky criticized the London Stock Exchange as "not rational" for an IPO, citing high costs and low liquidity compared to the US market. He pointed out the UK's 0.5% stamp duty on share transactions and limited liquidity as major drawbacks. Storonsky emphasized that unless the UK improves its competitiveness, the US remains the logical choice for Revolut's potential public debut. His comments come amid a significant exodus of companies from the London market, with 88 firms delisting or moving their primary listings in 2024.

The UK stock market is so dead. No new companies, no innovation, no competitiveness. Just stale old companies trudging along waiting to die 🥹 We just lost Dark Trace to the US too after an American investment fund bought them up.

At least global index funds only have like 4% of their weight in the UK, even that is too much in my opinion but hey ho it is what it is.

masonic

Is 0.5% stamp duty really the end of the world? It is nothing new. Makes you wonder why he decided to HQ in London.

Sounds to me like there is more to this story.

Martico

OP has no source or context around the quote. I'd want to see both before even starting to come to my own conclusion, if there is even a conclusion to draw

[Edit: particularly when seeing a loaded redtop-favoured word like "blasts" in the title of the thread.]

wmb194

Liquidity's not that bad. I guess it depends on how much he thinks he needs? More like he thinks he can obtain a better valuation in the US. Revolut has a US business so a US listing could be seen as an advertising opportunity.

masonic

Martico said:

OP has no source or context around the quote. I'd want to see both before even starting to come to my own conclusion, if there is even a conclusion to draw

[Edit: particularly when seeing a loaded redtop-favoured word like "blasts" in the title of the thread.]

It is a news story written up in response to this podcast episode.

subjecttocontract

Well it's only worth worrying about those things we can do something about......and nobody is gonna do anything about his problems short term.

Martico

So from what I see he criticised the UK's stamp duty level. Which makes flotation in the UK not a rational decision for his company. As reported by an institution with apparent skin in the game for lower regulation. And we know where that's taken us in the past.
Not saying the UK or its Stock Market are above criticism by any means, but hey

masonic

I haven't watched the podcast, but can only assume the challenging path to Revolut gaining its banking licence (with restrictions) was probably mentioned, and might have also coloured this opinion.

Martico

Yup. I don't pretend to come close to understanding the ins and outs of Revolut's issues, or the pros and cons of the LSE, but I hate to see leading clickbait headlines that offer no context or balance. That was what got my hackles up

Baldytyke88

subjecttocontract said:

Well it's only worth worrying about those things we can do something about......and nobody is gonna do anything about his problems short term.

After a quick Google, one blog was saying it could be better to raise revenue by corporation tax. Since corporation tax has just had a massive increase, when the Government wants to appear to support lower business taxes, they may consider reducing stamp duty on share transactions.

wmb194

Baldytyke88 said:

subjecttocontract said:

Well it's only worth worrying about those things we can do something about......and nobody is gonna do anything about his problems short term.

After a quick Google, one blog was saying it could be better to raise revenue by corporation tax. Since corporation tax has just had a massive increase, when the Government wants to appear to support lower business taxes, they may consider reducing stamp duty on share transactions.

How would reducing stamp duty achieve that? It's only due on secondary market purchases anyway*, primary issuance e.g., IPOs and rights issues is exempt. It's more a tax on investors than business and it also raises an easy c.£3.5bn a year.  Not that I would complain if it was trimmed e.g., France's equivalent is 0.3% and Spain's 0.2%.

*Market makers are exempt.