Reuters is reporting that Copenhagen based Retail FX and CFDs broker Saxo Bank is considering going public locally, on the Nasdaq Copenhagen stock market. The transaction would be a traditional initial public offering, or IPO, to retail and institutional investors.

The news comes a month after Saxo Bank pulled out of a merger transaction with a special purpose acquisition company, or SPAC, that would have seen Saxo become publicly traded on the Euronext Amsterdam exchange at a valuation of about $2 billion.

Saxo Bank CEO Kim Fournais was quoted by Reuters as saying that:

“There’s always been a wish to eventually do a listing of Saxo… It depends a little bit on the external circumstances. Hopefully, they look much better during this year or the next, but it could be even later. We learned a lot in the process of the SPAC, which also means we’re in a position where we can react quickly.”

The IPO push at Saxo Bank seems to be coming from its two largest shareholders, China’s Geely Group (52%) and Finland’s Sampo (20%). Reuters reported a Sampo spokesperson as saying that Sampo does not see Saxo Bank as a core investment and aims to reduce its stake, though it is not in a rush to do so. Sampo has been cutting its exposure outside of non-life insurance, selling its stake in Scandinavian lender Nordea last year.

A Geely spokesperson was quoted as saying that “Geely’s support for Saxo Bank’s management and its strategy continues to this day and into the future.”

Geely and Sampo made their investment in Saxo Bank at a valuation of about $1.3 billion, so a $2 billion valuation exit would have been at a nice profit. However the planned (previous) IPO valuation of $2 billion would be at a steep premium to Saxo Bank’s “comp group” of publicly traded online brokers such as IG, CMC Markets, Plus500, Swissquote, and XTB. Those companies trade at a P/E multiple in the high single digits, about 8-9 times earnings, which would give Saxo Bank a valuation of about $600-700 million based on last-twelve-month net profit of about $74 million.