THG chief to give up 'golden share' following stock price drop

The Hut Group (THG) founder and chief executive Matthew Moulding is giving up his ‘golden share’ in the company in a bid to regain the confidence of investors after the online giant’s share price plunged in recent weeks.

The group confirmed on Monday that Moulding is to cancel his special share rights, which gives him greater voting powers over the business.

THG said the move will further “good corporate governance” at the company, and will “facilitate” its application to step up to the premium segment of the main market of the London Stock Exchange in 2022.

The group, which owns online beauty destination Lookfantastic.com and fashion brands MyBag, Coggles and All Sole, first went public in 2020 with a 5.4 billion pound valuation.

But the group’s stock price plunged 35 percent last week over concerns about its corporate governance.

THG eyes premium listing on LSE

“After the anniversary of our 2020 listing we feel that the time is right to make this next step and apply to the premium segment in 2022, thereby continuing the development of THG as we endeavour to deliver our strategy for the benefit of our shareholders, key stakeholders and employees,” Moulding said in a statement.

Shares were up 16 percent on Monday after the announcement.

For the year ending December 31 2020, revenue at THG soared 41.5 percent to 1.6 billion pounds.

Revenue at the group’s beauty division increased 57.1 percent to 751.6 million pounds, while revenue at its THG Ingenuity was up 7.3 percent to 137.3 million pounds.

The company reported an operating loss of 481.8 million pounds, compared to a profit of 33.5 million pounds a year earlier, citing one-off, non-cash items including costs associated with its IPO and Covid, as well as a 331.6 million pound non-cash share-based payments charge.