Halfords set for £680m share float

FOUR directors of car parts and bike shops Halfords stand to share a windfall of around £30m when it floats on the stock market early next month.

Management will own 7.3% of the equity, which would be valued at £684m if the share sale hits the top of today's 250p-to-300p pricing range.

Chief executive David Hamid is the largest individual shareholder with just under 2%, and is not selling any shares in the float.

His colleagues Nick Carter (finance) and Ian McLeod (trading) each hold just under 1% and will be selling up to a quarter of their shares.

Non-executive chairman Rob Templeman also has a sub-1% holding. He made millions selling Harveys and Homebase and is making another fortune running Debenhams for CVC, the venture capital group behind Halfords.

CVC paid Boots £427m for Halfords in August 2002 and will keep a 45.6% stake.

Hamid said: 'One has got to have a bit of concern about the stock market at the moment, but we have been preparing for this for some time and CVC and management are long-term shareholders in the business.'

With about 400 stores and 9,500 staff, Halfords made pre-tax profits of £27.8m on sales of £579m last year.