By Gordon Smith
FT.com
Moneysupermarket on Wednesday priced this month’s planned share offering at between 170p and 210p, raising £388m at the mid-point of that range and valuing the entire share capital of the price comparison website at just under £1bn.
The company plans to sell about 40 per cent of its shares to pay off debt and release capital for its senior management team, which includes Simon Nixon, a co-founder of the website, which was founded in 1999.
Bookbuilding for the floatation, which is set to be one of the largest retail offerings since the collapse of the dotcom boom in 2000, will start later on Wednesday.
Mr Nixon, chief executive, stands to make about £115m from the sale of 60.3m shares at the middle of the price range, which values the amount being raised at between £346.8m and £428.4m.
Moneysupermarket is one of the most popular websites that allows users to compared the prices of various financial products including mortgages, loans, car insurance and utility services. Last year it drew 64m visitors to the site and is planning to expand into Spain, France and Germany.
But it faces growing competition from rivals including Confused.com, moneyexpert.com and moneyfacts.co.uk. It also faces the launch of several new sites which are planned for later in the year. Gocompare.com is being set up by former employees of confused.com and Tesco plans to launch tescocompare.com before the end of the year.
The listing also comes at a time of challenging market conditions with concerns about rising interest rates and fragile consumer sentiment growing.
