Investec Corporate Finance would be the first designated adviser for the alternative exchange, AltX, which will list small and medium growing companies, the JSE Securities Exchange South Africa announced on Monday.
Robert Smith, from Investec Corporate Finance, said that the company would be extremely selective about the companies it took to the market.
”A comprehensive due diligence investigation into the management and business of each organisation we represent will be conducted.
”We may even consider taking a private equity stake in the businesses we back. Investec takes a long-term view on AltX and we see the market as an opportunity to find young winners and to support them throughout the growth cycle.
”Due to the broad nature of our business, we are also able to offer companies a number of other services including project financing and structured financing.”
The new market is expected to open for trading in late October.
Investec would eventually hope to take the AltX companies it represented to the main board.
”Consequently we are more concerned with quality than quantity.”
Noah Greenhill, manager of AltX, said: ”The JSE has been astounded at the amount of interest we have had from companies requesting information to list on the new market.
”A number of organisations have now submitted applications to become designated advisers to the new market. We evaluate the expertise and experience of these prospects and we will put interested companies in touch with approved designated advisers.
”We are delighted that an organisation of the calibre of Investec is first to express confidence in AltX.” – Sapa