Connecting Excellence Group PLC Announces Institutional Subscription Raising £600,000

Subscription raising £600,000 at 1.50 pence per share, with institutional participation alongside continued support from strategic investor Adam Back

LONDO, UK / ACCESS Newswire / September 22, 2026 / Connecting Excellence Group Plc (AQSE:XCE)(OTCQB:XCELF), the international executive recruitment group with a long-term, ambitious and disciplined Bitcoin (BTC) treasury strategy, announces that it has raised gross proceeds of £600,000 through subscriptions for 39,999,999 new ordinary shares of £0.000001 each (“Ordinary Shares”) in the Company (the “Subscription Shares”) at an issue price of 1.50 pence per Subscription Share (the “Issue Price”) (the “Subscription”).

The Issue Price represents a premium of 3.4% to the closing mid-market price of 1.45 pence per Ordinary Share on 21 September 2026.

The Subscription Shares will rank pari passu in all respects with the Company’s existing Ordinary Shares.

Use of Proceeds

The net proceeds of the Subscription will be applied towards the Group’s Bitcoin treasury, its acquisition strategy and its hiring strategy, and may include a contribution towards completion of the proposed acquisition announced by the Company on 1 September 2026, a specialist recruitment business which holds 8.216 Bitcoin.

As announced on 1 September 2026, the proposed acquisition remains subject to further legal and financial due diligence, to funding being in place and to the execution of a definitive share purchase agreement. There can be no certainty that it will proceed or complete. A further announcement will be made in due course.

Related Party Transaction

Adam Back, an existing substantial shareholder in the Company, has subscribed £200,000 for 13,333,333 Subscription Shares. His participation in the Subscription constitutes a related party transaction pursuant to Rule 4.6 of the AQSE Growth Market Access Rulebook. The Directors consider that, having exercised reasonable care, skill and diligence, the related party transaction is fair and reasonable as far as the shareholders of the Company are concerned.

Admission and Total Voting Rights

An application will be made for the admission of the Subscription Shares to trading on the Aquis Stock Exchange Growth Market (“Admission”). Admission is expected to occur on or around 29 September 2026.

Following Admission, the Company will have 506,498,952 Ordinary Shares in issue, each carrying one voting right. The Company does not hold any Ordinary Shares in treasury. Therefore, following Admission, the total number of voting rights in the Company will be 506,498,952, and that figure may be used by shareholders as the denominator for the calculations by which they determine whether they are required to notify their interest in, or a change to their interest in, the Company under the Disclosure Guidance and Transparency Rules.

Scott Ellam, Chief Executive Officer of Connecting Excellence Group, commented:

“This raise has attracted institutional participation alongside continued support from Adam Back. That is a strong signal that our strategy – acquiring profitable, owner-managed recruitment businesses and holding them, coupled with a Bitcoin treasury – is beginning to be embraced by the market.

“The acquisition structure we announced recently is replicable, and there is a large target market of profitable owner-managed recruitment businesses suited to XCE’s scalable model.

“We look forward to updating the market in due course.”

The Directors of the Company accept responsibility for the contents of this announcement.

This announcement contains information which, prior to its disclosure, was inside information as stipulated under Regulation 11 of the Market Abuse (Amendment) (EU Exit) Regulations 2019/310 (as amended).

About Connecting Excellence Group Plc (“XCE”):

XCE is an international executive recruitment group with a long term, ambitious and disciplined Bitcoin treasury strategy. The flagship recruitment company, Spencer Riley, places senior executives with clients globally across a number of high growth markets including engineering, logistics, life sciences, automation, tech, professional services and B2B services.

The Bitcoin treasury strategy sets the foundation for the Company’s scalable recruitment business to attract and retain high performing talent with individual performance linked share option incentives to increase revenue, profit and cashflows. In the future, XCE can also expand market share through strategic acquisitions, at very little cash cost, using performance-based equity incentives to provide immediate and ongoing shareholder value. XCE is also building a dedicated Bitcoin executive recruitment division, enabling executives to find their role within either Bitcoin businesses or traditional businesses looking for Bitcoin talent worldwide and accelerating corporate education, integration and adoption of Bitcoin.

Website: xce.io
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Important Notice:

Connecting Excellence Group PLC holds treasury reserves and surplus cash in Bitcoin. Bitcoin is a type of digital asset. Whilst the Board of Directors of the Company considers holding Bitcoin to be in the best interests of the Company, the Board remains aware that the financial regulator in the UK (the Financial Conduct Authority or FCA) considers investment in Bitcoin to be high risk.

At the outset, it is important to note that an investment in the Company is not an investment in Bitcoin, either directly or by proxy. However, the Board of Directors of the Company consider Bitcoin to be an appropriate store of value and growth for the Company’s reserves and, accordingly, the Company is materially exposed to Bitcoin. Such an approach is innovative, and the Board of Directors of the Company wish to be clear and transparent with prospective and actual investors in the Company on the Company’s position in this regard.

The Company is neither authorised nor regulated by the FCA. And Bitcoin is unregulated in the UK. As with most other investments, the value of Bitcoin can go down as well as up, and therefore the value of the Company’s Bitcoin holdings can fluctuate. The Company may not be able to realise its Bitcoin exposure for the same value as it paid in the first place or even for the value the Company ascribes to its Bitcoin positions due to these market movements. And because Bitcoin is unregulated, the Company is not protected by the UK’s Financial Ombudsman Service or the Financial Services Compensation Scheme.

However, Bitcoin is formally recognised as personal property in the UK under the new Property (Digital Assets etc) Act 2025, which received Royal Assent on December 2, 2025. This legislation has removed previous legal uncertainty by establishing a new, third category of personal property to accommodate digital assets that do not fit traditional definitions.

The Board of Directors of the Company with a history of a Bitcoin treasury prior to becoming a public company, has taken the decision to invest in Bitcoin, and in doing so is mindful of the special risks Bitcoin presents to the Company’s financial position. These risks include (but are not limited to): (i) the value of Bitcoin can be highly volatile, with value dropping as quickly as it can rise; (ii) the Bitcoin market is largely unregulated – there is a risk of losing money due to risks such as cyber-attacks, financial crime and counterparty failure; (iii) the Company may not be able to sell its Bitcoin at will – the ability to sell Bitcoin depends on various factors, including the supply and demand in the market at the relevant time, with operational failings such as technology outages, cyber-attacks and comingling of funds potentially causing unwanted delay. The Board of Directors of the Company does not subscribe to such a negative view, and therefore ascribes to the ‘Bitcoin, not crypto’ mantra and has a ‘Bitcoin only ethos’. However, prospective investors in the Company are encouraged to do their own research and verify before investing.

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SOURCE: Connecting Excellence Group PLC

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