IPO Advisor Bulletin - Autumn 2024

2024 remains a productive year across our Issuer Services business. Having welcomed two new London IPOs this quarter alone, GenIP and CK Infrastructure Holdings, we're also witnessing an increase in the desire for issuers to be ‘corporate governance ready' ahead of any future decision.

We're also proud to welcome new clients, GSK, Pearson, Prudential and 16 JP Morgan Investment Trusts – all moving to Computershare in the last six months.

We remain committed to our network – and it's been hugely gratifying to host and present various panel events with our advisor peers which is helping maintain our community as the market steadily builds momentum.

Cecilia Williams, Client Solutions Director

Ensuring our client's subsidiaries are in check

As M&A activity continues apace, we continue to work with those issuers with decentralised subsidiary models by ensuring they increase the accuracy and visibility of their governance obligations. By keeping their entity data all in one place, Computershare, especially around corporate changes, can save issuers time and facilitate consistent service levels by exploiting its local and global cultural expertise.

Learn more

2024 AGM reports

We expand on key insights from FTSE listed issuers with key governance trends from the 2024 meeting season. Highlights:

• All markets saw a fall in contested remuneration report votes in 2024
• ESG is no longer about activism, it is a whole-of-business issue
• Digital proxy appointments continue to surpass physical submissions

Read UK AGM Intel Report

Read Georgeson's European AGM Season Review

UK Dividend Monitor

In Q3, UK dividends fell to £25.6bn, down 8.1% year-on-year. The mining sector was the main driver of lower payouts but fewer special dividends, a strong pound and share buybacks also made an impact.

Regular payouts, which exclude special dividends, dropped 3.5% on a constant-currency basis to £25.3bn. Cuts by a few companies obscured better growth in the wider market - encouragingly, company median per-share growth was 4.5%.

Read Dividend Monitor

Industry events

We remain committed to building a community with our advisor partners – and this quarter was a bumper one in terms of events! Please do contact us if you would like to learn more about supporting our event series.

Investment Trust Insight Panel | London

Our Investment Trust Insight Panel, drew on expert panellists who shared invaluable insights on the latest trends, market conditions and listing rule changes, which sparked great conversations.

IPO Preparedness event | London

We hosted an IPO Preparedness event with Equitory, IR consultancy and Emperor, communications agency. Over two in-depth and animated panels, we shed light on the benefits of acting like a quasi-listed entity well in advance of a listing – as well as the necessity of early governance planning.

OpenSpace networking series | London

Our OpenSpace networking series - a community designed to develop future company secretary leaders - is now in full swing. October's interview with Megan Barnes, Head of Secretariat at Ocado Group, proved to be very popular.

We're growing!

If you've a keen interest in financial markets, you're driven and motivated by building strong relationships - I'd love to hear from you. Computershare is looking for a business development manager based in our London office.