Existing AJ Bell shareholders, including chief executive Andy Bell and fund houses Seneca and Invesco, gained £169.3m from selling their shares when the platform listed on the London Stock Exchange this morning.
The fund houses, directors and employees who were reducing their holdings are now locked into an agreement not to further reduce their stakes for at least six months.
The company confirmed that AJ Bell customers, who were granted the right to buy shares before the company listed, will collectively own 20 per cent of the business at the time of the listing.
The company is valued at £651m, with the shares priced at £1.60 each but this morning the price of its shares have already increased to £2.10.
Mr Bell said: "The IPO is a significant milestone for the business and I see it as firing the starting gun on our next phase of growth, which I’m massively excited about leading the business through.
"The demand for our IPO from both blue chip institutions and our own customers was a real endorsement of our business and the market opportunities that lie ahead of us and I’m pleased to welcome our new shareholders on board.
"I’d also like to thank our employees who do so much day in, day out to ensure we deliver great service to our customers and help them to invest."
Richard Parfect, a fund manager at Seneca, which owns AJ Bell shares across a number of its funds, said: "We’re pleased that AJ Bell has reached this stage in its evolution. We look forward to continuing to play a part in the growth of AJ Bell and are delighted that one of our funds’ earliest investments has been such a material benefit to our investors.
"Well structured, easy to use, and fairly priced platforms have a compelling place to enable customers to manage their savings portfolios. A market listing should help raise the profile of the platform and it’s feasible that others will follow."
david.thorpe@ft.com
