Ryanair to drop London Stock Exchange listing to comply with EU post-Brexit rules

Ryanair has confirmed it will quit the London Stock Exchange next month to comply with EU ownership rules that have hit the airline industry following Brexit. The move will end the Irish carrier’s 20-year listing on the LSE, making it one of the clearest examples of how the UK’s exit from the EU has affected London’s capital markets. Ryanair warned earlier this month that it was considering leaving the LSE because of EU rules requiring airlines to be owned and controlled by nationals from within the bloc, Switzerland, Norway, Iceland or Liechtenstein. The airline has barred non-EU individuals from buying shares in the company for nearly 20 years, and in January extended this to institutions and individuals in the UK after the country left the bloc. On Friday, Ryanair said it expected the last day of trading in its London-listed shares to be December 17. Although the airline’s primary listing is on the Euronext in Dublin, London has long been a more liquid market than Dublin for its stock. However, the volume of its shares traded on the LSE has tumbled since January and now comprises just 10 per cent of the total, according to calculations by Mark Simpson, an aviation analyst at Goodbody. “The volume of trading of the shares on the London Stock Exchange does not justify the costs,” the airline said on Friday. UK shareholders who held Ryanair shares before January have been able to keep their holdings but are barred from attending or voting at annual meetings. But the carrier has struggled to keep new UK investors out. It had to eject some UK shareholders in September through the forced sale of 1m shares after they bought into the company.<br/>