Blow to London as another huge firm moves main stock market listing to New York

Paddy Power owner Flutter is to switch its primary stock market listing to New York in another significant blow to the London stock exchange.

Flutter Entertainment, which also owns Betfair and PokerStars, confirmed that a vast majority of shareholders voted in favour of the move at its annual general meeting (AGM) on Wednesday morning.

The company, which was previously called Paddy Power Betfair, currently has a primary stock market listing in London and gained an additional New York stock market listing at the start of the year.

The firm has rapidly expanded in the US in recent years through its FanDuel sportsbook business as a raft of states have loosened their gambling restrictions.

Shortly after gaining its New York listing, it proposed to move its main listing to the US.

The switch is now expected to complete by the end of May after the vote gained shareholder backing.

Flutter will still keep a secondary listing in London, meaning its shares could also be traded there.

The move will give the company a chance to be included in the big US indices, but means it will now be removed from London’s FTSE indices.

It is another blow to the London Stock Exchange amid a dearth of new listings of the index.

It also comes after travel firm Tui dropped its London listing in favour of listing only in Germany earlier this year, while building supplies firm CRH also recently moved its main listing to the US.

The London Stock Exchange Group (LSEG) has said that last year was “poor” for company listings, but it is encouraged by the pipeline for this year.

London has struggled to attract new companies over the last year, and several businesses that are listed in the capital have abandoned or downgraded their listing.

These include travel giant Tui, which is ditching its London listing in favour of Frankfurt, Paddy Power owner Flutter, which will likely shift its main listing to New York, and medical company Indivior, which could do the same.

“In our equities business, we continued to work with the industry, regulators and Government on market reform,” LSEG said in February.