City’s richest man to sell third of his firm in £800m listing

Peter Cruddas, the son of a meat-market porter who founded the online trading firm CMC Markets, is to cement his reputation as the City’s richest man by unveiling plans for a stock-market flotation that will value his company at more than £800m.

Cruddas, who founded CMC in 1989 with a £10,000 investment and is steadily building it into a global player, will reveal within the next two weeks that he is to sell about a third of the company to external investors. Sources close to Cruddas said an announcement had been pencilled in for this Thursday but the timing could slip slightly.

CMC specialises in trading contracts-for-difference, traditionally the domain of investment banks, among the private investment community. It also offers other services, including foreign exchange, spread betting and gold and oil trading.

The company already has operations in Australia, China, Germany and America, and Cruddas wants to take the business to more markets, including Canada and Japan. Cruddas, who has a twin brother who works as a cabbie, owns the whole of CMC apart from small stakes held by key employees.

By taking CMC onto the stock market, Cruddas will cash in on the growing demand for companies offering high-tech financial trading services. The industry has created a string of immensely wealthy executives, including Terry Smith, boss of Collins Stewart Tullett, and Michael Spencer, founder and chief executive of Icap.

Crystallising a chunk of his fortune, which is estimated at £864m by The Sunday Times Rich List, will allow Cruddas to add to his portfolio of luxury homes in Britain, France and Monaco. Last year, the twice-married father-of-four paid himself £31m, making him one of Britain’s best-paid bosses.

An avid Arsenal supporter who commutes between the City and Monaco, Cruddas is also a charity donor, last year giving £1.5m to the international arm of the Duke of Edinburgh awards scheme.

The initial public offering is being co-ordinated by Deutsche Bank, with Deutsche and JP Morgan Cazenove acting as joint bookrunners.

Sources close to CMC said that decisions about the exact amount of the free float and its pricing would be made imminently.

Cruddas declined to comment on his plans. It is known he has been intending a float for some time, but has held it back until the price can be underpinned by a strong set of results. CMC is one of a number of companies that are coming to market in the next few months and they have been encouraged by the strong institutional appetite for shares.

Meanwhile, Michael Sherwood, co-head of Europe at Goldman Sachs, looks set to add to his £185m fortune. Sherwood owns a 32% stake in Sepura, which supplies high-performance handsets for the emergency services and has appointed Goldman Sachs and Rothschild to advise on a float.

The listing could raise further questions about conflicts of interests at Goldman Sachs after recent controversy involving takeover bids using the bank’s money. A spokesman insisted there was no conflict of interest over Sepura.

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