Not upheld: corporate action handling / liquidation of shares without consent / failure to facilitate tender offer complaint against Trading 212 UK Ltd

Decision detail

Summary

Mr B held Anexo shares in his T212 investment account. When Anexo was taken over by Bidco in September 2025, shareholders were offered PIK Loan Notes (non-tradable debt instruments) worth 60 pence per share. T212 initially indicated Mr B would receive these notes but later liquidated his shares at 26.95 pence per share without his consent, claiming the platform cannot support PIK loan notes or tender offer elections. Mr B complained that this caused him a loss of approximately £1,368.83 (potentially £3,262 with compound interest). The Ombudsman upheld T212's position, finding that the business's terms and conditions permit alternative arrangements for unsupported corporate actions, and that liquidating at the last available market price was fair and reasonable given the platform's technical limitations and the fact that Anexo shares became untradable following delisting.

The Ombudsman's reasoning

The Ombudsman found that T212's terms and conditions clearly permit the business to make alternative arrangements for corporate actions involving securities the platform cannot support. Since T212 cannot hold PIK loan notes (non-tradable private debt instruments) within any of its accounts, and Anexo shares became untradable following delisting, T212 was entitled to liquidate the shares at the last available market price as a fair and reasonable alternative. The business applied this approach consistently to all affected customers and acted in their best interests given the platform's technical limitations. The Ombudsman rejected Mr B's arguments that other brokers' capabilities or the existence of alternative account types should have enabled T212 to facilitate the PIK loan note offer, as T212 fundamentally cannot support private debt instruments.

How this compares

Source

Read the original decision on the Financial Ombudsman Service website