The shares of Charter Court Financial Services, a specialist mortgage lender, began trading on the London Stock Exchange this morning (29 September), buoyed by a £100m investment from Old Mutual Global Investors.
Charter Court describes itself as a “specialist mortgage lender”, and has three business units; Charter Savings Bank, an online only retail bank, Precise Mortgages which provides specialist and buy-to-let mortgages, and bridging finance for property purchases; and Exact Mortgage Services, a consultancy business for institutional borrowers.
The market capitalisation of Charter Court as it came to the market this morning was approximately £550m, so Old Mutual’s £100m investment equates to a stake of 18.1 per cent.
It is not disclosed which Old Mutual funds have bought the shares, though the £2.4bn Old Mutual UK Alpha fund, run by Richard Buxton, has significant exposure to UK banks, while the £3.07bn Old Mutual UK Mid Cap fund has around a quarter of the capital deployed in financial services companies.
Ian Lonergan, chief executive of Charter Court Financial Services, said the IPO showed the market’s enthusiasm for the Charter Court business model.
David.Thorpe@ft.com
