Astrazeneca’s listing movement would be ‘memorable loss’ for the London market

The pressure accumulates in the London Stock Exchange, with reports that the British pharmaceutical giant Astrazeneca You can move your list to the United States delivering another blow this week.

CEO Pascal Soriot is considering transferring the list of shares of the company of London to the United States, British newspaper The times He reported Tuesday afternoon, citing anonymous sources. It is said that Soriot’s frustrations with the regulatory environment of the United Kingdom, particularly the rules on the new medicine approvals and drug price systems, are promoting move.

Astrazeneca declined to comment on the Times report.

The departure of the United Kingdom market company would cause an important revenue of the index, since Astrazeneca is the most valuable business that appears in the FTSE 100 in London. The market capitalization of Astrazeneca was £ 161.2 billion ($ 221.1 billion) from the final price of Tuesday, according to LSE data.

The potential transatlantic movement of Astrazeneca would be added to concerns about the weakening status of London as a global financial center. Several companies have eliminated the London market or reconsidered plans to float actions in the city during the past year.

Toni Meadows, Head of Investment in the Management of Briss Brilling of London, described the rumored considerations of the list of Astrazeneca as “disappointing” for the United Kingdom capital market, but admitted that “it is not surprising” since it would form the last development with a broader established tendency.

Earlier this year, the reports arose that the Chinese Fast Fashion Giant Shein was looking to list in Hong Kong instead of London, when he becomes public. Last week, the Reuters news agency reported that the company planned to present a confidential presentation for an IPO of Hong Kong.

Meanwhile, the Cobalt Holdings metal investor confirmed CNBC last month that he had discarded plans for a London OPI, while the British Fintech Wise giant announced in June that he was moving his main list of London to New York.

Kristo Kaarmann, CEO and co -founder of Wise, said in a statement at the time that the measure would help raise awareness about the company in the United States, while giving the company better access to the “deepest and deepest and liquid capital market in the world.”

Historically, companies in London have had much lower assessments than their Wall Street counterparts. Investigation From the British Investment Manager, Rathbones, last year he showed that the price to term profits for the actions of the United Kingdom was 32% lower than those listed in the US. UU. Similarly.

On the other hand, the Financial Times reported Last week, the Norwegian software giant Visma had chosen London for his next public market debut.

“Large and important companies such as Astrazeneca seek an elevation of exposure to a broader investor base and will get it to move to a list of the United States,” said Bri Headows by email on Wednesday.

“The tendency to move the list, or the acquisition flow for the actions listed in the United Kingdom, highlights the value in the United Kingdom shares market, but does nothing to encourage a new offer of companies that list here to support the future position of the index in a global context,” Meadows added.

Claire Trachet, founder of M&A Advisory Trachet, said Astrazeneca changing her list to New York would represent “a memorable loss” for the London Stock Exchange.

“Given the complexity of the company, this is not simply due to the advantages of liquidity or assessment often cited by companies that come out, but a trump of low -performance capital markets, regulatory limitations and misaligned incentives that make it more difficult to climb and reward innovation in the home,” he told CNBC per email.

Trachet added that companies that are slats in London with a combined value of more than $ 100 billion had already made the transfer to New York in recent years, and the game of Astrazeneca would only be more than duplicate that figure.

“The potential movement makes painfully clear for the global markets that the United Kingdom is losing its advantage in the needs of world -class companies and scale -based,” he said. “This is not an isolated story, and that is the biggest problem. It is part of a broader change, where founders and joints are increasingly looking for the United States a deeper capital, a stronger support and a more ambitious investor base.”

Tom Bacon, partner of London in the BCLP Global Law Law firm, which has a division dedicated to mergers and acquisitions and corporate finances, labeled reports from Soriot’s desire for Astrazeneca to get away from London “very worrying”.

“I think this should sound the alarm for the United Kingdom government that they need to do more to support the city and our stock market along with our critical industries such as life sciences and pharmaceutical products,” he said.

Dan Coatsworth, an investment analyst at AJ Bell, said Wednesday that Astrazeneca’s reported plans seemed to be driven by commercial needs instead of pursuing a higher assessment, but added that moving the company’s list through the Atlantic “will not be an easy movement to achieve.”

“Unlike many other deserters in the United Kingdom market with a dominant base of US shareholders such as CRH and Flutter, Astrazeneca has a more geographically diverse group of investors,” he explained in an email.

However, Coatsworth said Astrazeneca generates about 42% of its US sales, and already has plans to increase its operational footprint in the country.

Earl this year, CEO SORIOT He said CNBC Astrazeneca was “very committed to the United States”, where the company has two large research and development centers.

AJ Bell’s Coatsworth told CNBC that Astrazeneca CEO could also see a complete list of US actions as a “trampoline to receive a better treatment in the United States.”

European pharmaceutical companies face uncertainty about their future in the US market, where the president of the United States, Donald Trump, has threatened to impose specific tariffs from the sector to drug imports.

Although the industry was exempt from the so -called Trump’s reciprocal tariff plans when they presented themselves in April, the White House leader has placed the sector under investigation by the United States Department of Commerce, warned Tariffs on pharmacists “will arrive soon”, and signed an executive order that directs medication manufacturers to reduce the price of some medications in line with the costs paid abroad.