Financial recruiter Imprint saw its share price fall dramatically, down 21% — 41p, on the day it announced that OPD Group had walked away from discussions about a possible takeover.

Kean Marden, support services equity analyst at Kaupthing Singer & Friedlander, told Recruiter: "The key is that OPD's share price has fallen; to complete the acquisition it would have had to issue more and more shares to finance the deal."

However, Marden said the deal may resurface in future because OPD still has a 5% holding in the company through its subsidiary, PSD.