By Yadarisa Shabong
(Reuters) -Metals investor Cobalt Holdings said on Monday it plans to raise about $230 million in an initial public offering in London, potentially the largest listing in the UK capital since early 2024, in which Glencore will take a stake in the group.
The company, which holds physical cobalt and has a contract to buy from Glencore, plans to use the majority of the IPO proceeds to buy an initial 6,000 metric tons of the key battery metal, worth around $200 million, from the global miner.
Glencore and affiliates of investment firm Anchorage Structured Commodities Advisor have agreed to buy about 20.5% of the shares to be offered in the IPO, it said.
Prices of cobalt, used in electric vehicle battery components and portable electronics, have been languishing at historically low levels, which the company says it believes offers a buying opportunity as it bets that prices will eventually rise.
“We believe now is the right time to build a strategic stockpile of cobalt,” Cobalt CEO Jake Greenberg said in a filing.
Cobalt Holdings said its shares are expected to be admitted to the stock exchange in June. According to Dealogic, it would be the biggest London IPO since Air Astana’s listing in February 2024.
The move is a boost for London, which has struggled to attract new listings, prompting reforms last year to make it more competitive with New York and the European Union after Brexit.
Several London-listed firms in recent years have moved their primary listing to New York or picked Europe for IPOs, where they believe they can fetch better valuations.
Other UK firms have been de-listed due to takeovers by private equity and foreign firms alike, shrinking the size of London’s stock markets.
Plans for Cobalt Holdings’ debut follow online trading platform iFOREX’s statement on Friday that it was considering listing in London, in signs that the city’s IPO market may be seeing a revival.
The markets are also awaiting a potential listing of Shein after Reuters reported last month that the online fast-fashion retailer had gained UK approval for a London IPO.
(Reporting by Yadarisa Shabong in Bengaluru and Anousha Sakoui in London; Editing by Mrigank Dhaniwala and Jan Harvey)
