The London Stock Exchange(LSEG) - Insight day

 

Wow! What a great day out. From seeing the success and struggles in M&A's to being able to learn the CEO of moonpig's story, this insight day was packed with learning and excitement. I used text to speech here and then gpt to fix up my grammar, so forgive f incorrect in places or if any EM dashes have been used.

Keynote: Why the city matters?

Neil Shah started by explaining why London is one of the most exciting places to build a career in finance. Londinium was founded in the 15th century, and this city is used to raise capital, manage risk, and shape the general economy. The power of London comes from its proximity; for instance, during the pandemic Rolls Royce was able to be saved as £80 billion was raised. There are about 2.4 million people that work in financial and professional services, which is about two-thirds of the total amount of people in the whole world.

Session 1: How does the stock market work?

Live trades, real-time polling, and expert insights. This interactive panel breaks down how shares are bought, sold, and tracked. From brokers to registrars, meet the people behind the scenes.

Panel of experts:

• Stacey Parsons (Retailbook)
  Helps the youth get into IPOs where possible and also helps the IPO process itself by allowing companies to go public.

• Alex Pollen (Berenberg)
  An investment banker who is a central cog in the public market. He also helps businesses go public and is also a mouthpiece between companies and investors, acting as the middleman.

• Chris Dyett (CEN Group)
  Representative of companies; interested in sustainability and consulting about the matter. He explained how companies usually believe that sustainability is an add-on; however, he truly believes that for long-term growth sustainability has to be one of the more important objectives that a company should reach.

• Andrew Lyons (Computershare)

So, what is the stock market? It is a market where you can buy shares like any other market. Here we also learned the difference between a public and a private market, the difference being mainly the amount of paperwork and bureaucracy you have to do about your company; for instance, the amount of filing and data that you have to show to the public. Here we learned the difference between institutional investors and retail investors. Institutional and retail investors differ primarily in their size, investment goals, and access to opportunities. Institutional investors are large entities like pension funds or mutual funds that manage significant sums of money, often on behalf of others. Retail investors are individuals investing their own money for personal financial goals.

There are also different types of markets even on the London Stock Exchange. For instance, the FTSE 100, the FTSE 250, the FTSE 350, the FTSE Small Cap, the FTSE AIM market, and many more. The difference between each other is firstly the market cap and secondly the type and amount of capital you are trying to raise.

Session 2: The Life of an IPO - From Private to Public:

What is an IPO and why does it matter? This panel dived into how companies go public, who is involved, and what it takes to pull off a successful deal.

Panel of experts:

• Helena Somervail (Rothschild & Co.)

• Emma Brown (Computershare)

• James Macey-White (Teneo)

• Lamia Farag (Deloitte)

• Adam Carling (Pennington Manches Cooper)

This was a really interesting session, learning more about the specifics and the stages of getting an IPO out. The one thing I found interesting was how IPOs are so susceptible to not working out because of potentially inflated market caps or speculation causing them to feel either over- or undervalued by the markets.

Here we learned the different routes to capital, making your shareholder base quite diverse, and reporting your financials and how this is really important in the life of an IPO. We also learned specifics about the people on the panel, such as how Helena was mainly into bringing IPOs into public, Adam was more focused on the uprooting of an IPO, Emma was more focused on registration and helping support IPOs on the public exchange, and James was explaining to us the power of an IPO.

We looked at the stages in detail. I found it interesting how in phase three you have to see the type of investors; and if they are all hedge fund managers and the share price goes down, this could lead to a rapid drop in the share price. Additionally, during periods of geopolitical uncertainty many companies tend to stay private. The analysis suggested how private companies holding larger leads to problems when trying to raise public capital.

There were a few challenges to the IPO process itself, such as having to manage multiple parties that might leak to the press, some time delays, external shocks, a lack of valuation transparency, and also the aftermarket. The biggest challenge that many companies face is education and governance. There is a difference between running a company privately and running a business to operate for the shareholders. For instance, reporting interim and annual results means companies really need to make sure that what they are doing is great not only for the firm but for the shareholders too. They have to be transparent and also meet deadlines which are set by them and their shareholders. We learned about the challenges of having to meet deadlines and how a tech company that sold tech products was bullied into lowering their price for their product as the public came to know about how they needed to make a reserve for the amount of computers that they sold. Many IPOs are not always successful, and this is often due to exogenous factors or black swans such as Britain being affected by the Russia–Ukraine war.

Session 3: Crack the Code – How Pros Analyse Companies?

This was a great opportunity to see what a professional does in his day-to-day job, analyzing a company and producing a one-page A4 report that he can show to a potential investor from 50 pages of research that he has done in the previous few months. We learned terms such as spread (the difference between a bid and an offer) and liquidity in the trading market. What I found really interesting was how pension funds and other funds tend to like a mixture of liquid and illiquid assets to ensure that they have liquidity but also a good rate of return on their investment. What was also interesting to find out was that if you have a portfolio that is mainly invested into hedge funds, your company is seen as more risky because a small shock can cause many to leave the company, which would lead to the stock price and share price falling.

We also looked at the factors that influence whether to buy a company, such as how the company is growing right now and if they are germinative. This person often looks at it from the fund manager’s perspective but also the tech company’s perspective, looking at whether the company price is going up and whether he should invest in it, or whether a company’s price is going down and he should stay away from it, while additionally helping public companies with their day-to-day running and giving advice and helping them communicate ideas.

What are the reasons for a share price to go up and down? The profit the company is making and the time value of money, and obviously also supply and demand.

Looking at the company Cranware:

1. Get information that you can put in the model

2. Learn where the costs are, such as one-time investments that will provide revenue later but are significant costs right now, or recurring net drains

3. Look at the valuation and the valuation of similar companies

4. Look at multiples analysis: the P/E ratio and the sales the company is making

5. Do a DCF

6. Finally, make a sensitivity report for busy fund managers

Session 4: How Do M&A Deals Work?

Ever heard of a merger or acquisition? This session walks you through a real deal, who is involved, why they happen, and how they are structured.

Panel of experts:

• Amandeep Nagra (KKR)

• Chris Cork (Hays Mac)

• Adam Stocks (Travers Smith)

• Mohammed Khan (PwC Corporate Finance)

• James Smith (Investec)

The different approaches of how M&As are done include programmatic, selective, and transformational. There is a lot of work done with the risk; for instance, in a company that has more than 1000 employees you need to check whether each individual employee is being paid above minimum wage, check patents, and do a lot of paperwork to see whether the company can continue sustainably in the long run. Many lawyers and accountants work hand in hand to check the data about companies and whether this is a reliable source.

    

We learned about how a lot of work is done with the CMA and looking at the combined market share of each individual company to address whether monopolistic competition may arise. The CMA has 40 days to approve a merger or acquisition or is required to tell them to provide more information and then will get back to the companies in nine months.

Adam Stocks gave an example of Assura, who manage GP and private hospital land. He explained the different steps in the process of merging a company, USS, and how his company KKR did a lot to ensure that the merger was as successful as possible with regard to the price per share.

We were told to be good with numbers, have curiosity, and consider taking up an ACA. It might also be good to go into a regulatory position in the first few years of your life to really learn a lot about the financial world.

On the subject of workplace bias we were also told about LinkedIn and how powerful a tool it can be. We were advised that you have to be thoughtful, and getting recommendations is really good for the CV. It is also worthwhile considering having something to talk about in conversations, even if it is with people that you do not think are useful right now. It is also important to develop hard skills as well as soft skills, and also make sure that you are really good at communicating your ideas. Staying up to date with the recent AIs such as Perplexity, Claude, Cursor, Ide, Agentic AI, and whatever else the IR community is saying is also important.

Session 5: Workshop – Trading and Investment

We were split into groups of 10 and were given some time to pick out a portfolio to gain the biggest returns on investment. I took a leading role in this activity alongside a person who had a master’s in finance from Imperial. Together we managed to get our team to come to second place by informing our decisions based on the current scenarios that we were given in front of us. For instance, we discussed how if interest rates are being capped by the Bank of England at 0 percent change, it would be a good idea to invest in tech companies as they are likely to invest more in their capital. Additionally, we mentioned how if gold prices start rising this suggests greater geopolitical uncertainty and hence we need to ensure that the companies we are investing in are not global.

This was a really good activity for us to complete, and I learned skills that I would not have otherwise if I had stayed at school.

Session 7: From Startup to Stock Market-  Moonpig’s Story

A fireside chat with Nickyl Raithatha, CEO of Moonpig. We learned how a startup grows into a listed company, and what it takes to lead that journey. This was an incredible opportunity to meet such a big CEO; he was so humble and so willing to give us advice. He started off by giving a bit more information about Moonpig and explained how it had a 70 percent share of the greeting card industry because of its amazing relationships with their customers. He said the main differentiator between them and other companies is how they are a technology shop more than an online shop and really understand the relationship between a gifter and a gift, which is why they are great with customers.

We learned about the CEO’s journey from a student studying economics to someone who went into investment banking, then a hedge fund, and decided to quit and go into entrepreneurship. He ran a business three days later in Sydney, then started another random business, and finally reached a position as the CEO of Moonpig.

What was particularly interesting was how he decided to take risks early after he felt that he was ready financially by accumulating capital early. He made sure he had a safety net to hold back on. He also suggested how important networking was and how networking really helped him gain access to invaluable advice. Additionally, he mentioned how he tried to hire people that he knew would fit well in the team by reading about them and how important it was to build this rapport early on.