Lately, the mid-market investment bank Peel Hunt (PEEL) has been banging an ominous drum.
“Our industry has been dramatically hollowed out over the past five, 10 years,” its chief executive Steven Fine told the Financial Times last week. Two days before, the group’s head of research, Charles Hall, painted an even gloomier outlook, claiming in a report that at current levels of IPO and M&A activity, the FTSE Small-Cap index could be on track to disappear by 2028.
At first glance, the data in the report doesn’t exactly back up those dark headlines. Across the main and junior markets, Hall says 13 active bid target situations worth at least £100mn emerged in the first quarter of 2024 – but lists only 12. Among this dozen, both Henderson Eurotrust’s (HNE) proposed merger with its sister fund, Henderson European Focus (HEFT), and the potential takeover of Abrdn European Logistics (ASLI) by an as-yet-unnamed acquirer are included – even though investment trusts are excluded from Hall’s definition of the FTSE Small-Cap index.