London’s stock market collapse is ‘massively overstated’, says Hunt
Mr Hunt believes the UK could have its own ‘Magnificent Seven’ within a decade – MANDEL NGAN/AFP via Getty Images
Concerns over the demise of London’s stock market are “massively overstated”, Jeremy Hunt has said.
The Chancellor on Thursday sought to play down fears that the Square Mile is in terminal decline, instead claiming that seven tech giants will be listed in the UK in the next decade.
Mr Hunt told the Wall Street Journal CEO Council Summit: “I think London’s stock market demise is massively overstated. We do have challenges, and we’re addressing those challenges.”
It comes amid mounting frustration about the increasing number of companies quitting London in favour of listings overseas.
Paddy Power owner Flutter last week confirmed plans to move its primary listing to the US, which comes after the departures of travel giant Tui and building materials supplier CRH last year.
Cybersecurity company Darktrace also recently announced its exit from London’s stock exchange after being bought by US private equity firm Thoma Bravo in a £4.2bn deal.
The exodus of companies has coincided with a dearth of new listings, with Kazakhstan airline Air Astana among the few to float in London in 2024.
However, Mr Hunt said overhauling the UK’s listing regime will help stave off competition from New York, Financial News reported.
Mr Hunt said: “Our prospectus rules will make [London] every bit as competitive for tech founders as Nasdaq.”
The Chancellor also highlighted plans to help Britain’s pension funds invest in fast-growing companies under his Mansion House reforms unveiled last summer.
This includes proposals to consolidate smaller pension schemes into superfunds focused on riskier UK stocks.
Mr Hunt said: “London needs to be competitive on two things. First of all, we need to make sure you can access that wall of money here, which is why we’re doing the big pension fund reforms.
“Secondly, what we need to do for tech in particular is to demonstrate that actually, you can go all the way from a startup to a successful IPO here in London.”
The Chancellor also blamed large US tech stocks for widening the valuation gap between London and New York.
The rally on Wall Street stocks has been mainly driven by the so-called Magnificent Seven, including Alphabet, Amazon, Apple, Meta, Microsoft, Nvidia and Tesla.
Mr Hunt said: “I predict that in a decade we’ll have seven UK tech stocks of our own, and that will pull up the London stock market exactly the same way that tech stocks are doing in the US at the moment.
“Why? Because we are Europe’s technology hub and we have that pipeline of great companies.”
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