Just Eat To Delist From London Stock Exchange
Another blow for UK’s ambition to attract tech firms to its stock market, after Just Eat Takeaway requests LSE delisting
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The UK has been dealt another setback in its hopes to attract big name tech firms to the London Stock Exchange.
CNBC reported that Anglo-Dutch food delivery firm Just Eat Takeaway.com intends to delist from the London Stock Exchange (LSE), after completing a review of optimal listing venues.
This decision means that Just Eat Takeaway.com’s listing in Amsterdam will be its sole trading venue.
It comes after British chip designer ARM Holdings in 2023 had dashed UK hopes of a dual public listing in both London and New York, despite the highest level political interventions from UK politicians.
London listing
According to the CNBC report, Just Eat Takeaway will delist from the London Stock Exchange from 8am London time on 27 December.
But 24 December will mark the final date of trading of Just Eat Takeaway’s shares on the LSE.
Just Eat Takeaway explained its decision to list its shares from the LSE, and reportedly said it was an attempt to “reduce the administrative burden, complexity and costs associated with the disclosure and regulatory requirements of maintaining the LSE listing, and in the context of low liquidity and trading volumes.”
Just Eat Takeaway shares slipped 1.5 percent following the delisting announcement, CNBC reported.
The development underscores industry concerns about the ability of London and its markets to generate wealth for the country.
The LSE for example only recorded 23 listings in 2023, a 53 percent year-on-year decline in the IPO count.
And the LSE only has 1,720 companies listed in total, which is significantly down from the more than 3,250 listed companies back in 2007.
Just Eat Takeaway
Just Eat Takeaway had been created when London-based Just Eat had merged with Amsterdam-based Takeaway.com in a £6.2 billion deal back in 2019.
The UK’s competition regulator approved the merger in April 2020.
The entity experienced strong growth during the Covid-19 pandemic, but the post Covid world has not been kind and Just Eat Takeaway reported a 9 percent slump in customers in 2022.
In March 2023 Just Eat Takeaway.com said it would cut about 1,700 delivery jobs and 170 head office roles worldwide amidst a slowdown in takeaway delivery demand.
Then earlier this month, Just Eat Takeaway.com said it would sell its GrubHub arm to New York-based online takeout startup Wonder for $650 million.
This is a huge drop from the $7.3 billion it paid in June 2020 to acquire the American food delivery app.
