LONDON (Agefi-Dow Jones)–GSK shares fell 19.6% to 1,382 pence on Monday as its consumer healthcare arm, Haleon, spun off, effective today. Haleon shares are trading at 322.90 pence on the London Stock Exchange, compared to an IPO price of 330 pence, giving the company a market capitalization of 30.5 billion pounds sterling (35.9 Billions of Euro’s).
Haleon’s IPO is one of the biggest on the London Stock Exchange in years and the company’s split marks the biggest change for GSK, until recently called GlaxoSmithKline, since it was formed through of a mega-merger in 2000.
The transaction aims to accelerate GSK’s growth by allowing it to focus on innovative medicines and vaccines.
Pure player in consumer health, Haleon has both many brands of hygiene products, including Sensodyne and Aquafresh toothpaste, and drugs sold without a prescription, such as the anti-inflammatory drug Advil and the analgesic Panadol. The company was born from the merger over the years of the consumer health activities of GSK, the Swiss laboratory Novartis and the American Pfizer. The latter still holds 32% of the capital of Haleon, while GSK controls 13.5%.
As part of the split, GSK distributed to its shareholders one Haleon share for each GlaxoSmithKline share held.
Haleon, which achieved a turnover of nearly 10 billion pounds in 2021, aims in the medium term for annual organic growth of 4% to 6%.
-Denise Roland, The Wall Street Journal
(French version and contribution Valérie Venck) ed: ECH
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July 18, 2022 06:12 ET (10:12 GMT)