Watchdog Wary as Suspension Applications Increase
December 1, 2008, The Financial Times

As reported in The Financial Times, share suspensions – when a public company has its shares removed from trading for a time – are rarely granted by the UK Listing Authority (UKLA), a branch of the Financial Services Authority (FSA). However, according to some lawyers, current market conditions may incite more companies than usual to apply for a suspension.

"Suspending a listing is an obviously difficult situation – a lot of which are non-vanilla by their nature – and the UKLA has tended to take the view that it would rather retain as flexible an approach as it can," says Andrew Croxford, a partner in the Banking and Capital Markets Group at White & Case in London.

"Just because you're going through a difficult time and are negotiating with bankers doesn't mean you should have your shares suspended," says Andrew Caunt, who is also a partner in the Firm's London Banking and Capital Markets Group. "The FSA is very clear it won't suspend shares just to help a company fix its share price. There needs to be a reason that shows the smooth operating of the market is being jeopardized."