Share Marketability

P/E Ratios: Mind the Gap!

If your business exit plan is a trade sale, then you will be interested in taking advantage of differential Price Earnings (P/E) ratios.  A P/E ratio is the multiple of future maintainable earnings (profits) used to value a business. The P/E ratio appropriate for valuing your tech business will depend upon the quality, stage, size and share marketability of both your business and the acquirer business, eg:

• SME private company          3 – 7
• Larger private company       8 – 14              (Source: BDO PCPI Index)
• AIM public listing                10 – 126            (FTSE AIM Tech)
• Full LSE public listing           8 – 95             (FTSE techMARK All-Share)

The best business acquisition for an acquirer is where their own business is valued using a higher P/E ratio than they pay you for your business – exploiting this P/E ratio  ‘gap’ creates shareholder value, eg: If an SME business with annual profits of £250k were sold to a large private company for 6 x earnings, this will cost the acquirer £1.5m + fees and stamp duty (say, £60k). If the acquirer is itself valued at 10 x earnings, this transaction will almost magically create shareholder value of £940k ((£250k x 10) – (£1.5m + £60k)). Understanding and exploiting this ‘gap’ will assist you in valuing the worth of your business to different potential acquirers.

Disclaimer - All information in this post was correct at time of writing.