On the morning of January 4, 2021, at the first session of the stock market year, a financial earthquake shook Great Britain. On New Year’s Day, the UK left the European Union. And the first effect materialized immediately, on the screens of traders, the most sensitive thermometer in each country: the London Stock Exchange she lost the scepter of queen of Europe on bargaining. Amsterdam it overtook London: all the exchanges in Euro had suddenly moved to the Dutch stock exchange from overseas. Never like a Paternoster Square, the headquarters of the London Stock Exchange, under St. Paul’s Cathedral, but the proverb “good morning starts in the morning” is fallacious. Started under bad auspices, 2021 ended as the year of records for Lseg: 122 freshmen landed on the list, the highest number since 2014; it’s almost 17 billion pounds of capital collected with the prices, a level not seen since 2007.
The Apocalypse that is not there
The dethronement from the stock market podium seemed to be only the first knight of an announced apocalypse: the end of London’s primacy as the financial capital of the Old Continent due to the villainous Brexit. The prophecies have been disproved: not only has there been no disaster, but London has even beaten Europe. The raising of capital on the primary market (quotations) exceeded that of Paris and Amsterdam combined. Adding up also the secondary issues, capital increases and offers of securities, the total is close to 50 billion pounds. “2021 was a significant year for London – he commented Murray Roos, head of the Capital Markets division of Lseg – and thanks to the simplification of the rules London is a candidate to become even more a pole of attraction for raising capital in Europe “playing on the distinction between European, as a geographical expression, and the EU, an expression political-administrative. For the London Stock Exchange, Brexit also coincided with a redemption: the price list, accused of being too exposed to traditional banks and industries, therefore not very attractive for global investors because it lacks big names in technology, has also been converted to port for the big tech: they debuted Oxford Nanopore, a DNA sequencing company, with half a billion capitalization; and the fintech giant Wise, with 8 billion, changing the face of the market. The tech sector alone is worth 39% of the entire IPO capital raising.
The Deliveroo flop
To spoil London’s success a bit, however, was the disaster of Deliveroo: Hailed as the largest high-tech freshman, with an estimated value of 9 billion, the food delivery app at home, of which the billionaire is also a shareholder Jeff Bezos, it was a sensational flop. The stock began to collapse from day one and today it is down by -50% since its debut. 2021 was also the year of the almost consensual “divorce” between the London Stock Exchange and the Italian Stock Exchange. The LSEG group, in the wake of the merger with the American data bank giant Refinitiv, which required the sale of some activities linked to Italy, the British took the opportunity to cut even the last financial link with the continent: Piazza Affari. Lseg sold Borsa Italiana to the French of Euronext it’s at Cdp (Cassa Depositi e Prestiti). The roads of the UK and the EU on finance are now totally separate. Indeed, openly in competition.