Payments company Nets to set listing plan in motion next week

By Ole Mikkelsen and Pamela Barbaglia COPENHAGEN (Reuters) - Denmark-based card payment services company Nets aims to publish its plan for an initial public offering (IPO) next week, two people involved in the process told Reuters. An IPO on the Copenhagen bourse had been targeted within about five years of its acquisition by private equity firms Advent International and Bain Capital and Danish pension fund ATP in March 2014. But the company's progress since that 17 billion Danish crown (1.94 billion pounds) deal has been faster than expected, enabling the plan to be brought forward. "The company plans to publish the intention to float announcement next week, followed by a prospectus within weeks," one of the sources said. A second source said that the listing should take place in September, adding: "Market conditions look good, there shouldn't be any delay." The decision comes despite a troubled period for the Danish IPO market, rocked by the bankruptcy of ship fuel supplier OW Bunker seven months after its shares were listed in 2014. Only three companies have gone public on the Copenhagen bourse since then, while the Swedish market has had 30 to 50 listings a year. Analysts are unsure about the valuation of Nets because it has not published earnings since March, but a number have said that a market capitalisation of between 30 billion crowns and 35 billion crowns is likely. British payments processor Worldpay Group was listed on the London Stock Exchange in October last year with a valuation of 4.8 billion pounds ($6.34 billion). Sources said that Morgan Stanley and Deutsche Bank are acting as global coordinators while Nordea and Danske Bank have been hired as arrangers. A spokesman from Nets said the company is on track for a listing but the timing has yet to be decided. (Additional reporting by Nikolaj Skydsgaard; Editing by Susan Fenton and David Goodman)