Recent Investment Banking Highlights
Stifel Acted as Financial Advisor on Unbound Group PLC’s transition to AIM
Transaction Type: Transfer of listing to AIM
Industry: Consumer & Retail
Stifel Role: Financial Advisor, Sponsor and Nomad
Prior to becoming Unbound Group PLC, Electra Private Equity plc, listed on the premium segment of the LSE, was in the final stages of its realisation strategy by divesting or spinning-off its investee companies. In 2021, Electra demerged Hostmore plc, leaving Hotter Shoes as the sole remaining asset in its portfolio.
Stifel acted as financial adviser, sponsor and nomad to Unbound Group on the transfer of its listing to AIM. The Company initially wanted to explore a trade sale for Hotter Shoes but after exploring this option, the Board concluded that more value would be created for shareholders by listing the business on AIM. Stifel acted as financial adviser across the whole transaction, sponsor in respect of the delisting and certain related party arrangements, and nomad to the admission to AIM. The transaction allows Unbound Group to continue to pursue its transformation strategy, while shareholders should benefit as the Unbound Group platform develops and generates revenues.
Stifel’s broad advisory capability from consumer sector expertise, M&A, sponsor coverage and UK public markets enabled us to continue to advise the Company across a range of services and deliver the best outcome for the Company and its shareholders. Extensive pre marketing provided insights into potential new investors as well as expected rotation in the share register which was dominated by institutional investors and small cap retail investors. The Stifel continues to regularly engage with Unbound Group as ongoing nomad and corporate broker.
Stifel Nicolaus Europe acted as financial advisor to BeonTag in the acquisition of Scandstick Group
Transaction Type: Buy side M&A
Industry: Paper & Packaging
Stifel Role: Advisor to Buyer
Scandstick Group was founded in 1981 and is one of Europe’s leading manufacturers of self-adhesive materials for the label printing industry. The group consists of Scandstick AB and Linerless AB, and operates factories in Höganäs (Sweden), Aalst (Belgium), Celje (Slovenia) and in Moszna-Parcel (Poland). The product portfolio encompasses a wide range of label facestock materials including paper, films, thermal, thermal transfer and linerless technology, with hot melt and acrylic adhesives.
Headquartered in Brazil, BeonTag is the leading self-adhesive materials and RFID manufacturer in Latin America. The company is expected to generate over EUR 500m in turnover in 2022 and is a BTG Pactual PE invested company. BeonTag has been rapidly expanding in EU through M&A and Stifel Paper and Packaging team has advised the company in two transaction in the region over the past 6 months, Scandstick Group and Stora Enso ECO RFID Antennas division.
This transaction consolidates BeonTag’s presence in Europe and reinforce its position as a global player in the sector.
KBW acted as Sole Financial Adviser to Ripe Insurance on its majority investment from Aquiline Capital Partners
Transaction Type: Sell-side M&A
Industry: Financial Services, Insurance
KBW Role: Sole Financial Adviser
Ripe Thinking Limited (”Ripe”) is a UK-based digital underwriting and insurance distribution platform and is one of the UK's largest specialist insurtech companies. The business brings together a rare mix of insurance, digital marketing and tech expertise. Multi-award winning, Ripe won the Insurance Times Personal Lines Broker of the Year award in both 2019 and 2020 and has recently been named in the top 100 fastest growing UK tech companies in the North. Aquiline Capital Partners LLC has entered into a definite agreement to acquire a majority stake in Ripe and will work closely with the company’s management team to continue and accelerate the build of a market-leading digital insurance distribution platform.
KBW acted as exclusive sell-side advisor to Ripe in connection with the transaction. The transaction signed in October 2021 and is subject to customary regulatory approvals.
Stifel Acted as Bookrunner on Marlowe plc’s £130m Equity Fundraise
Transaction Type: Follow-on Offering
Industry: Business Services
Stifel Role: Joint Bookrunner
Marlowe plc is a UK leader in business critical services and software which assure safety and regulatory compliance, whilst managing risk for businesses across the country. The company was formed to create sustainable shareholder value through the acquisition and development of businesses that provide regulated safety and compliance services, and software.
Stifel acted as bookrunner in raising gross proceeds of £130m. Key investors were blue-chip institutional investors in the UK, Europe and United States. The placing was made to fund the acquisition of Optima Health, the leader in technology-enabled corporate health and wellbeing, for a consideration of £135m. The board expects the acquisition to be 10%+ accretive to Marlowe’s adjusted earnings per share in the first 12 months post-completion. Pre-synergies the acquisition will increase Marlowe’s run rate revenues and adjusted EBITDA to c.£400m and c.£71m respectively.
Stifel has, for the fifth time since June 2020, successfully sourced significant and supportive UK, European and US based institutional investment. Extensive marketing of Marlowe over the prior three months provided insight about potential pools of new capital. This was after Marlowe stated its ambition over the next three years for continued organic and acquisition-led growth, targeting group revenues of c.£500m and adjusted EBITDA of c.£100m, which the board believe will be reached ahead of the original target of the end of FY2024.
Corporate Broking Wins
Stifel Europe is pleased to announce the addition of Trident Royalties plc and Instem plc to our growing corporate broking client portfolio. We are now the trusted advisor to 76 companies across 9 sectors, an increase of 19 clients over the past 12 months.
Trident Royalties is an AIM-listed mining royalty and streaming company that is building a diverse portfolio to broadly mirror the commodity exposure of the global mining industry. It has existing royalty agreements in copper, lithium, iron ore and precious metals. Trident joined our client base after a successful £30m follow-on offering in December, where Stifel served as joint bookrunner.
Instem provides advanced and best-in-class IT solutions to the global health and life sciences community which improves the productivity of their processes in the discovery and development of new drugs, therapies and products. Instem is our 6th client win in the Healthcare Technology sector.
2021 Review: Energy & Natural Resources
During 2021, Stifel raised $680m for our Natural Resources clients in London. This included the first and second largest E&P deals and the second largest mining deal completed in London over the year, demonstrating Stifel’s unmatched execution capabilities. 2021 and 2022 YTD retained broking mandates include: Adriatic Metals Plc, Afritin Mining Plc, Capital Limited, Endeavour Mining Plc, i3 Energy Plc and Trident Royalties Plc. Click here to find out more.
Stifel Wins U.S. Mid-Market Equity House of the Year
Stifel has been named 2021 U.S. Mid-Market Equity House of the Year by International Financing Review (IFR), recognizing outstanding capital markets achievement. In announcing the award, IFR noted that Stifel “used a global footprint to push into new frontiers of cryptocurrency, cross-border listings and other emerging technologies in 2021.”
Read the full announcement here and the IFR write-up here.
In the past 15 months, our ECM team has completed 39 UK equity transactions on the London Stock Exchange across all core sectors with an aggregate deal value in excess of £2.8 billion. Click here to find out more.
Chairman and CEO Ron Kruszewski has reported Stifel’s fourth quarter and full year results, noting “the growth of our product offering has made us increasingly relevant to both wealth management and institutional clients” and says “the outlook for Stifel remains as strong as I’ve seen in my 25-year tenure as CEO.” Our Investment banking pipeline is also at record levels.
Ron was recently featured on CNBC's 'The Exchange' to discuss Stifel's earnings, and how investment banking has been impacted by the pandemic. He also discusses his thoughts on IPOs, capital markets and the Fed. In case you missed it, a replay is available by clicking the here.
From Hospital Ward to Investment Banker: An Interview
with Dr Nicholas Moore
Ahead of the Curves Podcast: Post-Covid what does the future of healthcare look like?
Covid has been the biggest challenge health systems have faced in generations. Looking forward, medical technology will have a major impact on how, where, by whom and how often care will be provided in the future. This podcast interviews Nick Moore, Cambridge University and Harvard Medical School graduate, now Managing Director for Biopharma & Healthcare at Stifel. In this wide-ranging podcast interview Nick talks about the effects of the Covid pandemic, how you learn to back winners within healthcare, the profound changes coming down the line in the practice of medicine, and the gulf between research and getting new treatments to the patient. Click here to listen.
That completes our "Monthly Insights" for February. Please do not hesitate to contact us if we can be of any assistance.
Until next month,
From all the team at Stifel.
https://stifelinstitutional.com/global-coverage/europe/
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