Fusion Acquisition Corp., which went public last Friday as a special purpose acquisition company, or SPAC, was established for the sole purpose of identifying and acquiring a private entity within the fintech, asset or wealth management sectors with the aim to boost the entity's operations and unlock its value by taking it public.
The company raised $305 million in a trust account by pricing its initial public offering of 30,500,000 units at $10 per unit, with units listed on the New York Stock Exchange. The units ended Monday's trading at $10.16.
Fusion is a so-called blank-check company that aims to use its proceeds to target businesses in the financial services industry with an enterprise value of roughly $750 million to $3 billion, and which have strong management teams, demonstrated organic growth and differentiated products or services.
“SPACs are unique in that they try to find one company that they can help go public,” said Jim Ross, chairman of Fusion.
He added that many SPACs are industry-agnostic about which companies to target, but that Fusion is focused on identifying businesses in the fintech, asset or wealth management fields because these are growth sectors loaded with upside potential.
Or, as its Form S-1 document describes it, Fusion wants to acquire an established business it believes is fundamentally sound but potentially would benefit from the financial, operational, technological, strategic or managerial improvements that Fusion’s management team can provide.
“Our goal isn’t to take out management, but more to focus them from a strategic standpoint to help them grow and go public,” Ross said. “The goal for us is to unlock value in the target company. There’s usually a difference in valuation between a public and private company, so you get the benefit from that.”
Ross is recognized as a pioneer in the exchange-traded fund industry, and during his long career at State Street he helped bring to market such products as the SPDR S&P 500 ETF Trust (SPY) and SPDR Gold Shares (GLD).
Fusion CEO John James is founder and CEO of BetaSmartz, a fintech company serving wealth and asset management firms. The company’s chief financial officer, Jeff Gary, has worked in portfolio management at BlackRock and AIG.
Regarding Fusion’s IPO, each unit consists of one share of Class A common stock and one-half of one redeemable warrant, with each whole warrant exercisable to purchase one share of Class A common stock at a price of $11.50 per share. Only whole warrants will be exercisable.