What is a trading company or trading group?

One of the conditions that must be satisfied by the investee company for the purposes of the SSE is that it must be a trading company or the holding company of a trading group or trading sub-group.

A particular definition applies to the terms ‘trading company’, ‘trading group’ and ‘trading sub-group’. In each case, the activities of the company, group or sub-group must not include substantial amounts of non-trading activities, such as the passive holding of investments or intra-group investment activities (this is explored further below).

A holding company means the principal company of the group or, in the case of a subgroup, the entity that would be the principal company of that subgroup except that it is itself a subsidiary of another company. The fact that one company holds shares