Dec. 15 (Bloomberg) -- Canaccord Financial Inc. is close to buying Collins Stewart Hawkpoint Plc, a brokerage in the U.K., the Globe and Mail reported, without saying where it got the information.

Canaccord, Canada’s largest non-bank brokerage, has been looking for a purchase in the U.K. for “months,” the newspaper said.

Collins Stewart rose 6.9 percent to 54 pence in London trading today. Toronto-based Canaccord was halted on the Toronto Stock Exchange before trading opened.

--Editor: David Scanlan

To contact the reporter on this story: Sean B. Pasternak in Toronto at spasternak@bloomberg.net.

To contact the editors responsible for this story: David Scanlan at dscanlan@bloomberg.net; David Scheer at dscheer@bloomberg.net.