Worldpay has made its debut on the London Stock Exchange in what is the U.K.’s largest IPO of the year. The payments processing firm is looking at a market cap of £4.8 billion ($7.3 billion) on £2.40 a share ($3.66). That puts Worldpay’s share price squarely in the middle of its initial £2.25 to £2.60 range.
That price was up 6 percent after conditional trading — City institutions run at trading the stock ahead of open trading.
The road to IPO has been interesting and varied for Worldpay, as the company found itself involved in a complex multi-party bidding war this summer. Wirecard, Blackstone, Hellman & Friedman, Ingenico and JPMorgan’s private equity arm were all in on the action making offers, and the firm was valued at the time at about $9 billion.
“Today’s announcement is a significant milestone for Worldpay,” said Chief Executive Philip Jansen, according to The Telegraph. “We are proud to be a leader in global payments with a clear strategy for continued growth as a listed company.”
“We have already invested over £1 billion in our technology, people and capabilities, helping us to become an advanced and sophisticated technology-led organization with great potential.”
Worldpay processes around £370 billion ($564 billion) in payments each year, from about 400,000 merchants. It also handles about 40 percent of European Web transactions. The firm brought in a profit of £765 million ($1.2 billion) on revenues of £3.6 billion ($5.5 billion). In the first half of 2015, sales were up 13 percent.
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