Danish fashion entrepreneur Anders Holch Povlsen has increased his voting stake in Funding Circle Holdings, the UK platform for small business lending, to just over 16 per cent. A regulatory filing shows his holding rose from 15.002123 per cent to 16.005913 per cent of the company’s voting rights.
The stake is held through entities that Povlsen controls, Brightfolk A/S and Heartland A/S, the vehicle through which he also holds his investment in online fashion retailer ASOS. According to the notification, the holding now amounts to 47,067,936 voting rights, all in the form of ordinary shares. No financial instruments or indirect voting rights were reported, and each of the intermediary companies is recorded as holding the same 16.005913 per cent.
The filing sets out a precise timeline. The threshold was crossed on 6 October 2026, the notice to the company is dated 5 October, and the form itself was completed on 7 October in Aarhus, the Danish city where Povlsen’s business empire is based. The notifying party is listed as Aktieselskabet af 2.7.2018, registered in Aarhus C. The disclosure was made on a standard TR-1 form, which shareholders in UK-listed companies must use when their holdings pass set thresholds under the Financial Conduct Authority’s Disclosure Guidance and Transparency Rules.
Funding Circle’s identity is set out in the filing as a London-listed company with the ISIN code GB00BG0TPX62. The notice does not say how much Povlsen paid for the additional shares or why he chose to increase his position at this point, and the filing contains no statement from either Povlsen or Funding Circle about his plans as a shareholder. Moving from just above 15 per cent to just above 16 per cent nonetheless strengthens his position as one of the company’s larger owners, with roughly one vote in every six now controlled from Aarhus through his holding structure.
The increase adds another UK company to the list of businesses in which the Dane holds a sizeable stake. Under the disclosure rules, any further move across a percentage threshold, up or down, will have to be reported to the company and the market in the same way. Investors following Funding Circle will be watching future TR-1 filings for signs of whether Povlsen keeps building his stake or holds at the current level.
