The former Conservative party treasurer, Peter Cruddas, is donating £1m to the Vote Leave campaign to quit the EU and has predicted that “big business names” will support severing links with Brussels.

The multimillionaire founder of CMC Markets, the online trading firm, said he expected Vote Leave to raise £20m with more business figures waiting in the wings. “We are confident we will raise that. There are some big businesses, big business names that are with us, but they haven’t declared yet.” he told the Financial Times.

The City of London has emerged as a key funding source for campaigns on both sides of the forthcoming referendum on EU membership, due to take place in 2016 or 2017. Two major figures in the London hedge fund industry, Crispin Odey and Sir Michael Hintze, are backing a Brexit, with EU regulation of financial services companies among their biggest concerns. However, two of their peers – David Harding of Winton Capital and John Armitage of Egerton Capital – came out last week as big donors to the In campaign, which is led by the Britain Stronger in Europe group. The Out campaign is led by Vote Leave and the Nigel Farage-backed Leave.EU.

Cruddas said he expected the referendum to galvanise the British public. “I think this will be the Scottish referendum times 10. It is a much wider, bigger issue which also has implications across the union,” he said. “There are windows in history whereby the British public decide what they want and it’s outside the control of politicians. This is one of those events.”



Peter Cruddas, pictured in 2012. He expects the referendum to galvanise the British public.

Expressing confidence that the Out campaign would win, he said: “If I was the politicians I’d hang on to my hat.”

Despite the backing of high-profile figures such as Cruddas, Odey and Hintze, the wider UK financial services industry is seen as largely pro-single market. Most of the country’s big financial services institutions, including US investment banks Goldman Sachs and Citigroup alongside domestic names such as the Lloyd’s of London insurance market and the City of London Corporation, believe Britain is better off staying in the EU.

The Out vote is backed

Cruddas’s donation represents a return to public and political life for the businessman, after he was forced out of the Conservative party in 2012 after a newspaper sting. Cruddas was subsequently exonerated in a libel action against the Sunday Times over false allegations that he charged £250,000 to meet the prime minister.

He told the FT that he had been “excommunicated” by the party three years ago but bore no grudge against the Conservatives and had met David Cameron recently. “We’ve all moved on,” he said.