Trio taken private in £28.5m deal

FTSE-listed Trio Holdings, a foreign exchange and money market broking firm based in London’s LIFFE Exchange building, has been taken private by its management in a £28.5 million transaction.

Backing the deal was mid-market private equity group Gresham, which provided some £16.5 million of the total consideration. The remaining £12 million came courtesy of HBoS’ debt finance team.

Explaining the decision to back the buyout, Gresham director Paul Canning commented that ‘although (Trio) is small in comparison to industry giants such as ICAP, we believe it is a leader in various products.’ The company will now trade under its original founding name of R.P. Martin, with Canning acting as a non-executive director.

In addition to purchasing the business from its shareholders, management has set aside a ‘pool of equity’, which will be used to attract new senior brokers to the company.

Leslie Copeland

Leslie was made Editor for Growth Company Investor magazine in 2000, then headed up the launch of Business XL magazine, and then became Editorial Director in 2007 for the online and print publication portfolio... More by Leslie Copeland