Made.com slips on London float

Furniture designer makes lacklustre debut in latest bout of IPO indigestion

ONLINE furniture designer Made.com today floated at the very bottom of its predicted price range today, but the shares still fell in a grim reflection of the state of London’s IPO market.

Three floats were put on ice last week and others were expected to follow as big City investors complain of suffering “IPO indigestion” from the huge number of companies that have come to market this year.

Made.com, backed by Lastminute. com founder Brent Hoberman (pictured) pressed on with its float despite the choppiness of demand with sources there saying the company had opted for a public listing for longer-term reasons and was therefore not troubled about dropping the price.

Originally expected to float with a value of as much as £1 billion, today’s 200p-a-share IPO set the shares running at a value of £775.3 million.

Unusually, the price range indicated to prospective investors was never published, but sources said it had been for 200p to 265p, meaning today’s price was at the very lowest end of the range.

Even so, the shares fell 8% initially before trading at 195p later.

Chief executive of Made Philippe Chainieux said: “A listing in London, where the business was founded, will enable us to accelerate our growth as we lead the development of the online furniture and homewares market as it moves online, both in the UK and internationally.”

Despite having to price the business lower than he might have hoped, Chainieux still raises £100 million of gross proceeds by issuing 50 million new shares.

The IPO was run by JPMorgan Cazenove, Morgan Stanley and Liberum.

The company uses a network of 150 designers to come up with product ranges which it then makes in small batches to sell through its website. It says it uses sophisticated data analysis to track what will sell and has built the most popular homewares brand for millennials. It claims to be profitable in the UK, France and Germany.

Last week saw the IPO of trading group Marex shelved, followed by delays in the floats of miner Tungsten West and fuel cell company Elcogen.

All blamed market conditions.