There are a lot more free floating shares out there now for Plus500 Ltd (LON:PLUS).
Just several hours after a group of Plus500 founders sold 9.39 million shares in the company for £145 million, another 11.4 million PLUS shares hit the market, with online gaming and financial trading company Playtech PLC (LON:PTEC) selling its entire 9.99% stake in Plus500 for proceeds of £176 million (USD $228 million).
Playtech had built up the stake in Plus500 in late 2015 prior to Playtech’s attempted $700 million acquisition of Plus500, holding onto the stake since that time. While Playtech wasn’t successful in that acquisition, which was nixed by UK regulators at the time, it ended up doing fairly well by holding on to its Plus500 shares. Playtech acquired those shares in the £3.50-4.00 range, and offloaded them for £15.50, for a profit of more than £131 million (USD $170 million).
While Plus500 is a competitor to Playtech’s Markets.com retail FX brokerage brand, this wasn’t the only ownership link between the companies. We had reported earlier this week that Odey Asset Management, Plus500’s longtime largest outside shareholder, had recently picked up a 5% stake in Playtech, following a recent near-50% decline in Playtech’s share price.