Business Insight Zone

Longtime Hoover’s editor John Willis keeps a close eye on our stock listings. (We cover the companies listed on every major stock-market index in the world.) This week he sent me this note:

Have you noticed recently the number of foreign, mostly European, companies that have begun delisting their shares from NYSE and NASDAQ?

The first I noticed, while doing index work, was Telekom Austria in mid-May, followed quickly by British Air and ALTANA.
Adecco and Bunzl were a week later.
A week ago was Energias de Portugal and Australia’s Amcor.
This week I see Imperial Chemical, Holland’s TNT, and Volvo. [Volvo is planning to delist, but it hasn't happened yet as I write this.]

Some of the press releases hint that it has to do with the burden of the SOX Act’s requirements; others come right out and say so. I remember hearing that this might happen and that European exchanges would probably be the beneficiary, but it seems to be gearing up in the last few weeks.

It’s interesting to me that this trend is gearing up now, years after the Sarbanes-Oxley (i.e. SOX) Act first kicked in. John tells me that some of these companies may also be delisting in part because they trade relatively few shares on U.S. exchanges. Mind you, plenty of other overseas companies are jockeying to list on U.S. indexes, but the loss of such large companies as the ones John cites is worth keeping an eye on.