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(Bloomberg) -- Unilever Plc will list its ice cream unit primarily in Amsterdam, the consumer goods company said, with London and New York getting secondary listings when the maker of Ben & Jerry’s is spun off this year.
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The decision will come as a blow to the London Stock Exchange, which had hoped Unilever could choose it as a single bourse or primary listing. The ice cream division’s home market of the Netherlands also wanted a sole listing, though the government said it welcomed the announcement on Thursday.
The company has faced intense pressure from the Dutch government to fulfill its previous promise — made when Unilever opted to base itself in the UK in 2020 — to list its wider food business in the Netherlands. It moved the ice cream business’s headquarters to Amsterdam from Rotterdam late last year.
“When you make a commitment as a company you want to live up to that,” Chief Executive Officer Hein Schumacher told reporters on a call, denying it was a snub to London. “We’re very committed to the success of the UK economy.”
Even so, the politics are awkward for the British government, which is trying to promote the UK as open for business after an unpopular tax-raising budget — and more broadly to talk up a financial sector still feeling the impact of Brexit.
Unilever shares slumped as much as 7.9% in London, the most on an intraday basis in three years, pointing to investor unease about the decision.
Speaking earlier to Bloomberg TV, Schumacher said using the three cities where Unilever already has listings would prevent “forced technical selling” by its shareholders and allow them to hold stakes in the ice cream division.
The US is the biggest market for Unilever’s ice cream brands, which also include Breyers and Magnum, and companies are increasingly flocking to the New York Stock Exchange where there is deeper liquidity and higher valuations.
New triple listings are relatively rare, with dual listings more commonly used to access different pools of capital. Recent examples include Hong Kong-listed CK Infrastructure Holdings Ltd, which added a secondary listing in London last year. New York-listed beauty group Coty Inc. began trading in Paris in 2023.
Other companies, though, have been opting to consolidate trading to cut costs and simplify their corporate structure. Travel group TUI AG ditched its London listing last year, saying liquidity in its shares was concentrated in Frankfurt.