Shares in Worldpay jumped six percent as the UK payment processor made its debut on the London Stock Exchange, valuing the company at £4.8 billion.
The offering of 51.9% of the company's outstanding shares is expected to raise about £2.16 billion pounds, with the company receiving around £948 million. Bain Capital and Advent International, Worldpay's private equity owners, will hold around 49% of the company's shares.
WorldPay has gone from strength to strength since it was flogged off at the bargain-basement price of £2 billion by Royal Bank of Scotland five years ago as part of bail out terms ordered by the European Union.
The company now employs 4500 people - double the numbers under RBS ownership - and recently reported half-yearly revenue and profits of £465.7m and £182.6m respectively. On a typical day, it processes approximately 31 million mobile, online and in-store transactions worldwide, supporting 400,000 merchants.
The group's private equity owners rejected a £6.6 billion takeover offer from French outfit Ingenico in favour of the public listing, which including debt puts a £6.3 billion price tag on the company.
UK Prime Minister David Cameron welcomed the news, which is expected to provide a much-needed boost to the moribund listings market: “It's fantastic news that Worldpay has listed on the London Stock Exchange today - the largest ever UK FinTech IPO. This shows real confidence in our long term economic plan and helps cement London as the world's leading location for this sector.”
At pixel time the initial excitement had worn off and the shares were trading back in the 250 pence debut price range.