CRH, the construction company with operations in the Americas and Europe, has announced it will shift its primary listing to the US alongside strong performance for 2022.
While a 12% jump in revenue to $32.7bn and 13% increase in EBITDA to $5.6bn will be welcome news for investors, the decision to shift their primary listing to the US is a blow for London’s markets.
“So much for making London the go-to place for companies to list their shares. London Stock Exchange is having to work overtime just to keep those already listed, let alone attract new ones,” said Russ Mould, investment director at AJ Bell.
“This week has delivered a triple blow to the stock exchange operator. First, we had reports that Shell looked at shifting its stock market listing and headquarters to the US, although that doesn’t seem to be on the table now. Second, reports suggest that chip designer Arm will not return to the London stock market and instead opt for a US listing.”
“Now we’ve got the news from construction group CRH that it wants to switch its primary listing to the US. That would mean it no longer qualifies for inclusion in FTSE indices and therefore would leave the prestigious FTSE 100 index.”
CRH Results
Strong performance in North America and Europe drove higher revenues and the company has successfully navigated higher input prices by achieving a 10bps increase in EBITDA margin to 17.2%.
“Our 2022 performance reflects the outstanding commitment of our people, the underlying strength and resilience of our business and the continued delivery of our integrated, solutions-focused strategy,” said Albert Manifold, Chief Executive of CRH.
“Despite significant cost pressures throughout the year, we delivered further improvements in profits, margins and returns. Our strong cash generation together with our relentless focus on disciplined capital allocation has also delivered the strongest balance sheet in our history, providing us with significant opportunities for further growth and value creation going forward.”
The inclusion of recent acquisitions also helped drive performance and CRH said their pipeline of potential acquisitions was a factor in their decision to switch their primary listing to the US. CRH said they believe the availability of capital in the US would be preferential to remaining a FTSE 100 company.