Aldermore Fires Starting Gun On £600m Float

One of Britain's leading challenger banks will unveil plans on Tuesday for a quick-fire stock market listing that will see its shares begin trading in a fortnight.

Sky News has learnt that Aldermore, which provides banking services to consumers and small and medium-sized businesses (SMEs), will announce its intention to float

A source close to Aldermore said that its board was meeting on Monday to rubber-stamp the announcement.

Aldermore wants to sell £75m of new shares, with backing already provisionally in place from more than a dozen blue-chip institutions.

Sky News disclosed earlier this month that Aldermore would price its shares at a substantial discount to a plan last autumn which would have seen the bank valued at £800m at the mid-point of its price range.

The listing was aborted because of choppy equity markets, leading directors to conclude that it should be "priced to go" this time around.

The proposed initial public offering (IPO) will seek a valuation for the bank of between £600m and about £650m, and would result in a free float of 40% of the company's shares, sources said.

Under the plans to be announced this week, Aldermore's shares would commence trading on 9 March.

In 2013, Lansdowne Partners and Toscafund injected about £40m into Aldermore in a deal which valued the lender at more than £450m.

Both funds are expected to consider buying additional shares as part of the IPO, which is being led by Credit Suisse (LSE: 0QP5.L - news) , Deutsche Bank (LSE: 0H7D.L - news) and Royal Bank of Canada (LSE: 0QKU.L - news) .

Aldermore is led by Philip Monks, a former Barclays (LSE: BARC.L - news) executive, and is majority-owned by AnaCap Financial Partners, a private equity firm.

Under the existing ownership structure, AnaCap holds all of the voting shares in Aldermore, although investors who buy in through the flotation will also gain voting rights.

Confirming a doubling of pre-tax profit for 2014 earlier this month, Mr Monks said it was "uniquely positioned to continue our growing support of...underserved market segments and have demonstrated a strong track record of strategic delivery".

Aldermore is not the only challenger bank eyeing a stock market listing.

Shawbrook Bank is also expected to announce a flotation in the coming weeks, while Metro Bank, which unlike its rivals has a high street branch network, has said that it is likely to target a listing in 2016.

Aldermore declined to comment.