ASX to sell $385m stake in tech provider Iress
The Australian Securities Exchange (ASX) will sell its 18.6% shareholding in tech provider Iress for $385 million.
“Now is the right time to divest”
Dominic Stevens, ASX’s managing director and CEO, says: “Iress has been an attractive investment for ASX over many years. But we believe now is the right time to divest as it no longer provides the strategic value to ASX that it once did.”
While not offering specifics, he explains that ASX is focused on a “multi-layered growth strategy”.
ASX invested in Iress’ initial public offering (IPO) in 2000, as both were predominantly focused on the Australian equities market.
Since then, Stevens says both businesses have evolved and expanded. Some of Iress’ recent deals include Australian challenger bank Xinja for digital home loans – and TSB for mortgage sales and originations.
According to ASX, the transaction will generate a post-tax gain of $161 million. It is reviewing its options for the proceeds of the sale and will provide an update upon completion of the review.
In other news, back in September 2018, ASX pushed back the go-live of its blockchain system to between Q4 2020 and Q4 2021.
As reported in December 2017, ASX announced its intended implementation of the technology to replace its existing equity transaction processing system.
The idea is to replace its current system, Chess (clearing house electronic sub-register system). In 2017, ASX said it had spent the two previous years researching and testing distributed ledger technology (DLT).
