African mobile payments business Airtel Money dipped in value from its float price after starting unconditional trading on London’s stock market.
Earlier this month, the company launched its Initial Public Offering at a roughly £5.3 billion valuation, in London’s biggest stock market float since 2021.
The shares were valued at £1.96 per share at the start of the IPO, although this declined slightly in initial conditional trading for investors originally allocated shares in the IPO.
On Wednesday, all traders and investors were able to start buying and selling the stock.
Shares in the company traded at around 181.3p after the London Stock Exchange opened, around 7.5% lower than the float price.
The stock has since recovered some ground but remained below the float level later on Wednesday morning, with shares sitting at around 186p.
This would represent a roughly 5% decline on the IPO price and value the company at slightly more than £5 billion.
Airtel Money has been spun off from separately listed FTSE 100 firm Airtel Africa, a leading telecoms provider which is part of Indian conglomerate Bharti Enterprises.
The firm is thought to be the first large African fintech to list on a global stock exchange.
The IPO adds to Bharti’s long-term investments in the UK, including the strategic stake in BT announced in 2024, shareholding in Eutelsat (previously OneWeb) alongside the UK Government and Scottish resort Gleneagles, according to the group.
Airtel Money is used by around 53 million people across Africa to make payments, pay bills, withdraw cash and access other money services.
Its biggest business is offering digital wallets, which enable people to store and transfer money, and access to loans and savings accounts.
Operating through a network of branches and kiosks, it generated revenues of around 1.4 billion US dollars (£1.1 billion) in the last financial year.
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