German investment company Rocket Internet announced on Tuesday the company intends to delist from stock exchanges in order to focus on long-term planning by being "better positioned as a company not listed on a stock exchange."
Six years since going public on the Frankfurt Stock Exchange, Rocket Internet revealed it will hold a shareholder meeting on September 24 to obtain approval to start the delisting process. Meanwhile, the company has launched a buyback program to secure 8.84% of its shares from the stock market. Current main investor Global Founders Capital will retain its stake of 45.11%, with Rocket's Chief Executive Oliver Samwer doing the same with his 4.53% stake.
"The use of public capital markets as a financing source as an essential parameter for maintaining a stock exchange listing is no longer required and adequate access to capital is secured outside the stock exchange," the company said in its statement.
Rocket Internet has failed to recover from the market plunge seen last March, as the company's shares lost more than 25% over the last year. At 12:59 pm CET today, its stocks dropped 0.69% to sell for €18.82 per share. Since the company's IPO, its market value sank from €6.7 billion to €2.8 billion.
