Ring fence on investment is breached
IN THE PAST two years, barely a month has passed without news of the latest Russian company planning an initial public offering. London has been the exchange of choice for the country’s largest companies, with Moscow garnering more new listings after the Federal Securities Market Commission’s decision to introduce a requirement that companies wishing to list overseas must also undertake a domestic listing.
Few sectors have held back from the dash to the market, with investors being offered the chance to buy into the oil and gas, consumer goods, metallurgy and telecoms sectors, to name just a few.
The one exception has been financial services. To date, not a single Russian bank has completed an IPO, leaving state-owned savings bank Sberbank, listed in Moscow, as the sole entry point for investment in the sector.
In some ways this has not...
