Scotland missed out on a new public listing during the autumn due to the referendum uncertainty, a leading legal adviser has said.
Savannah Petroleum, an exploration company focused on Niger, listed on the Alternative Investment Market on August 1, advised by Burness Paull.
Head of corporate finance Peter Lawson said: "They wanted to register it in Scotland, and looked at the potential risks that would come from being in Scotland because of the uncertainty about what there might be. In another time, they would have been a Scottish company, and that would have attracted even more profile."
Burness also advised Cirrus Logic on the takeover of Wolfson Microelectronics, a deal that also completed in August. "It was strategic for them and they felt even in the worst case scenario there wasn't a risk that would impact on the business," Mr Lawson said. "As a general trend, for international buyers coming into Scotland it didn't impact their strategy, especially in oil and gas, where firms tend to have interests all over the world and in jurisdictions which have far higher risk factors."
The oil price crash would impact deal prices in the sector, he added, but only by restoring them to more normal levels after becoming "a wee bit frothy".
But Mr Lawson said the year had seen a shift towards Scottish firms acquiring rather than being acquired. "In the Scottish market it was more of a sale team, what we have found certainly this year is we have a lot more acquisitions to disposals." He said post-crash firms had built up balance sheets, private equity had raised a lot of cash, and owner-managers had rebuilt businesses and were ready to pass them on. "The challenge is still leverage, though there is now more appetite for the banks to lend."
The deals were typical of a table-topping year for Burness Paull in Scotland's corporate transaction league, and Mr Lawson commented: "Every corporate deal team wants an IPO or public takeover and very few Scottish law firms will have an IPO." The first nine months of 2014 saw the firm handle 60 transactions worth £684m, ahead of Pinsent Masons on 38 and both Brodies and CMS on 37, according to Scottish Business Insider figures. On deals by value, CMS led on £1.79bn, followed by Pinsents (£1.25bn), Stronachs (£1.04bn), Maclay Murray & Spens (£1.03bn), Dundas & Wilson (£698m) and Burness Paull.
Among the accountants, the busiest firm was Anderson Anderson & Brown, though its 34 deals totalled only £4.8m, followed by Johnston Carmichael with 20 deals worth £7.4m, then BDO (13 worth £10.2m) , PwC (12 totalling £313m), Deloitte (10 at £51m) and KPMG (seven worth £883m).
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