Many delistings and few weight IPOs. Piazza Affari is slowly thinning its capitalization, unable to attract bigwigs, who decide to land or move elsewhere, and losing pieces due to mergers and delistings.
The delistings that reduce the capitalization of Piazza Affari
The last in chronological order is that of Autogrill, that following theoperation with Dufry which will lead to the creation of a 12 billion world champion in the food and retail services sector for travellers, will move to Switzerland, on the Six Swiss Exchange.
A similar choice had been made a few years ago by late Leonardo Del Vecchio which, after thethe merger of Luxottica with Essilor, decided to list the group only in Paris. And what about Atlantia, Coima Res, Fedon or the upcoming farewell of As Roma? According to the Milan Finance calculations, adding up the various operations (including the last one by Autogrill), Piazza Affari will lose around 22 billion in capitalization out of a total market cap of 645 billion euro, to which must be added the 11 billion of Euronext Growth.
What about IPOs?
If there are those who go, there are also those who arrive. Ir Top Consulting analysts predict the landing of 200 companies on Euronext Growth Milan, the segment of Borsa Italiana dedicated to high-potential SMEs, whose capitalization by the end of 2022 should reach 13 billion, with an increase linked to the new IPOs and growth in the FTSE Italia Growth index.
So everything fixed? Not exactly. Mostly they will land at Piazza Affari small company which inevitably will not be able to fill the "void" of those who have instead decided to say goodbye to the Milanese price list.
Two big blows could have come from fashion, with Prada which, however, back in 2011 chose to list in Hong Kong and Zegna which a few months ago instead decided to land on Wall Street. Many hopes are now turned towards Plenitude, Eni's business branch specialized in renewable energies. The operation should have taken place in these days, but was postponed to a later date due to market turmoil. "Although the two companies have found strong and widespread interest from investors in Plenitude, as well as significant consensus on its strategy, Eni has assessed that the volatility and uncertainty currently affecting the markets require a further phase of monitoring" , reads a note.
Meanwhile, according to data emerging from EY Global IPO Trends Q2 2022, in the second quarter of 2022 7 IPOs were made on the Italian market, down 30% from the same period in 2021. However, the glass is half full as the IPO business raised $0,6B in proceeds, an increase from Q2021 60 (approximately +XNUMX% ), thanks to a specific transaction completed at the end of the period.
“The large number and value of IPOs that have been postponed in the first half of the current year represent an important pipeline of operations which will likely hit the market when the current uncertainties and volatility subside – write the EY analysts – However, strong turbulence resulting from the current uncertainties and market volatility is likely to persist”.
