Intertrust Plans EUR500m Amsterdam IPO, Eyes Consolidation
September 21 2015 - 12:06PM
Dow Jones News
[Updates, rewrites throughout]
By Archie van Riemsdijk
Dutch-based financial services provider Intertrust aims to raise
about half a billion euros ($564 million) by listing on the
Amsterdam stock exchange, in order to repay debts and increase its
financial flexibility in an upcoming consolidation in the global
trust and corporate services sector, the company said Monday.
The IPO should be expected within a few months and "definitely
before the end of the year", a person familiar with the situation
told Dow Jones. The source estimates the expected market
capitalization of Intertrust after the IPO at around EUR2 billion,
considering the valuation of Capita Asset Services, which has
comparable activities.
The company said in a press release it will use the proceeds of
the IPO to repay some of its debts, but it also wants to use the
flotation to drive industry consolidation globally, to further
enhance growth.
"Access to the capital markets will give us added financial
flexibility to take advantage of opportunities during an important
period of consolidation in our sector", chief executive David de
Buck stated.
"The landscape is very fragmented with a lot of small players
and just a handful of large ones, including ourselves", spokeswoman
Anne Louise Metz added.
The company creates trusts and other legal entities for
multinationals and investment funds, implementing the advice given
to clients by their law firms, accountants or tax advisors.
The company, carved out of nationalized Dutch bank Fortis in
2009, is one of the world's largest players in this field, with
annual sales of nearly EUR300 million and leading market positions
in the Netherlands, Luxembourg, the Cayman Islands and Guernsey. Of
the world's 50 largest multinationals, 32 are doing business with
Intertrust, the company website states.
International regulation for trust services--entities that
manage holdings or other legal structures--is expected to increase
in the coming years. "We welcome that", Metz said. "It improves the
quality of the industry."
That industry has been under scrutiny of late, due to increasing
reports that large multinationals manage to pay far less in tax
than smaller companies or citizens, using an array of legal
entities and "shopping" around globally for tax treaties.
In June, European regulators opened formal investigations into
the tax practices used by Apple Inc., StarbucksCorp. and Fiat SpA,
in a move that tax experts said could deter major corporations from
using certain tax structures to shrink their tax bills.
However Intertrust operates well within the lines and uses
standards that are often more strict than regulatory standards, the
spokeswoman said. "Aggressive tax structures are not our
business."
Apart from the new shares, the IPO will probably also include
existing shares, the company said. Clients of private equity firm
Blackstone Group LP, which own 74% of the shares, may use the
opportunity to cash in a "limited part" of their investment. The
165 managers and employees that own the remaining part of the
company may also sell part of their shares.
Deutsche Bank AG (DB) and UBS Group AG (UBS) are acting as joint
global coordinators and joint bookrunners for the offering,
Intertrust said. Lazard is acting as financial adviser to the
company and shareholders.
Write to Archie van Riemsdijk at archie.vanriemsdijk@wsj.com
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September 21, 2015 11:51 ET (15:51 GMT)
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