Russia Business Directory

The past seven years in Russia have been a period of relative stability and economic growth. Investor confidence has been lifted by Russia’s consumer boom, incoming investments, petrodollars, high commodities prices and demand, lower inflation, and surging real estate and stock market. Against this market backdrop, the Russian IPO market has rapidly developed, writes Ernst&Young in the report "Globalization IPO Trends 2006".

Although this market is still smaller than that of industrialized countries, IPOs from Russia are the driving force behind European issuances these years. Russian companies gave the European IPO market a boost raising a record USD15.4 bn through eight deals, on the London Stock Exchange. The year’s largest Russian IPO, state-owned oil and gas giant, Rosneft, dual-listed in Moscow and London, and raised USD10.6 bn.

Since a Russian company going public is required to list 30 % of its offering on the domestic Russian exchanges, the big question is whether it will list abroad as well. Any company with more than USD5 bn in market capitalization needs more market capacity than Moscow can provide, so larger companies will dual-list: locally in Moscow, coupled with a cross-border listing. In the past two years, the preferred market has clearly been London — through a Global Depositary Receipt (GDR) listing.

Of the 21 Russian-domiciled IPOs in 2006, 7 were listed only in Moscow, while the other 14 were listed on the LSE (eight deals), AIM (fi ve deals), and NASDAQ (one deal). The inflow of Russian companies seeking to go public in London began in 2005 when consumer services company Sistema dual-listed in Moscow and London and raised USD1.5 bn.

Main stock exchanges

Russia on London Stock Exchange - section of London Stock Exchange devoted to Russian and CIS companies (eng)

RTC - Russian Trading System, listing leading Russian securities. The RTS Index is the benchmark in Russian securities' industry. The Index is computed on thirty-minute intervals using real-time prices of the most liquid stocks listed on the Exchange. The stock exchamnge encompasses two centralized stock markets – Classic and T+0 Market, the system of indicative quotation of securities RTS Board, FORTS (Futures & Options on RTS) derivatives market and over-the-counter FX market RTS Money (eng)

MICEX - Moscow Interbank Currency Exchange, the largest exchange in Russia, the CIS and Eastern Europe and one of the leading exchanges of the world. Total volume of trading in 2006 reached USD1,925 bn. Daily average volume of transactions is close to USD7,8 bn. Main activities: foreign exchange, trade in securities of over 600 Russian issuers, incl blue chips, corporate bonds, government securities; trading in the commodities market etc.

St.Petersburg Stock Exchange - one of the oldest stock exchanges, located in St.Petersburg (eng)

Navigator to Stock Exchanges - an one-stop page for searching data on stock exchanges, indices etc (rus)