Takeover battle for carbon credit firm

AN IRISH company, which is listed on the London Aim exchange, is at the centre of a takeover battle between a JP Morgan-backed company, and a Dutch investment vehicle set up by the company’s co-founder.

EcoSecurities, which is registered in Dublin, is a carbon credit company which develops emission-reduction programmes and trades carbon emission credits.

The company, which is headquartered in Oxford and employs just under 300 staff worldwide, has approximately 10 staff in its Dublin office.

Tom Byrne, founder and former head of corporate finance at Davy Stockbrokers is a director of the board, while Irish businessman PJ Browne is group company secretary.

According to Mr Byrne, the company has an “active presence” in Ireland, with all of the company’s legal, contractual and treasury operations taking place in Ireland. “We would hope that this would continue to be the case after the current negotiations regarding the company are complete” he told The Irish Times.

Ecosecurities was founded in 1997 at a time when concern about greenhouse emissions and the market-value of carbon credits as tradable commodities was emerging. The company manages a vast chunk of the emission projects overseen by the United Nations.

In 2005 it went public, with its flotation on the London AIM exchange raising an estimated €80 million. A second wave of financing followed in 2007 when the company raised €100 million, almost half of which was invested by Credit Suisse.

Although the company’s share price has suffered in the last year as oil prices and the price of carbon offsets dropped, there has been a flurry of takeover interest in the company this year.