Reported in the financial pages of a Sunday newspaper recently was a report commissioned by Dealogic which showed that 34 companies have floated on either the London Stock Exchange or its AIM junior market this year. The total value of those flotations or initial public offerings (IPOs) was £4.9 billion. This compares with last year where just 12 companies floated in London, in deals worth a combined total of £1.1 billion (And this compares to 2007, the last full year before the financial crisis, where 57 companies floated in London in deals worth a combined total of about £7 billion).

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There’s an interesting article in the Evening Standard today by Gideon Spanier (http://www.thisislondon.co.uk/markets/article-23855161-death-of-the-traditional-ad-agency-model.do). In essence, he focuses on the cyclical nature of the advertising industry where companies move from the big, one-stop-shop, full service agency to the specialist niche business.

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Who said that the recent Emergency Budget was all doom and gloom? Amendments are to be made to the Enterprise Investment Scheme (EIS) and Venture Capital Trusts (VCT) within the forthcoming Finance Bill, although the exact timings are still uncertain, which generate significant tax advantages to international companies looking to the UK for investment.

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While most people were focused on South Africa for the World Cup over the past few weeks, the corporate finance team was thinking about Africa for a different reason – our client has the license to mine gold and diamonds in The Republic of Guinea and sought admission to the PLUS quoted market following a successful private fund raising exercise prior to admission.

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