Publications featured in include: City AM, The Times and Money Marketing
£9.5bn was raised on the London based exchange through both IPOs and secondary fundraisings compared to £18bn on Europe growth markets as a whole.
AIM’s fundraising success should help allay recent fears that the LSE is failing to attract its fair share of IPOs.
AIM’s closest competitor was First North Stockholm, which saw £5.3bn raised in 2021, just 56% of the UK’s total.
By comparison, the Paris Alternext market raised just 5% of the European total with £827m, and the Borsa Italiana raised only 4% with £740m.
The last decade, AIM has solidified its reputation as the best junior stock market to float on in Europe. This is partly due to a programme of improved regulations, with companies on the index having to comply with a corporate governance code aimed at providing greater investor protection.
AIM’s largest fundraisers last year were:
- £350m raised by scientific land trust Life Sciences REIT
- £306m raised by vegan cosmetics brand Revolution Beauty Group
- £300m raised by identity data provider GB Group
AIM’s improved reputation, which has attracted more institutional investors to the market, has also helped increase its liquidity, with the average value of daily trading in AIM shares surging 47% to over £480,000 in 2020/21, from around £329,000 the year before.
As liquidity is attractive to both investors and the listed companies, investment-grade companies are likely to be more encouraged to list on a market with higher liquidity. Adding more of these companies has helped further improve AIM’s reputation as a highly credible index for institutional investors.
Dan Hutson, Partner in our London office said: “AIM has become a force to be reckoned with in the last decade, far outstripping the efforts of its European counterparts. The regulation put in place in recent years has allowed AIM to grow into the place to list and invest.”
“However, within certain sectors such as technology companies, AIM still faces very strong competition from other bourses. This is an area the LSE and HM Treasury will want to keep under review.”
