Russia’s Polyus board sets SPO price at $66.5 per share

MOSCOW, Jun 30 (PRIME) -- The board of directors of Russian gold producer Polyus has set the price of its secondary public offering (SPO) at U.S. $66.5 per share, the company said in a report Friday.

Polyus planned to offer from 7% to 9% of its capital, including $400 million worth of new shares and existing securities, including global depository shares (GDS). The company collected bids from June 15 till Thursday.

Boris Kvasov, director of equity capital markets at VTB Capital, one of the organizers, said that the bulk of the company’s shares were purchased by long-term investors.

“The deal enjoyed high-quality demand from investors. Most of them were long-term investors – they accounted for almost 80% of all allocations, including sovereign funds, which accounted for slightly less than 10%,” Kvasov said.

Russian pension funds also took part in the transaction and their share was less than 1%, he added.

Over 80 institutional investors have purchased the shares, Kvasov said.

Investors from the U.K. bought around half of the shares, Russian investors purchased slightly over 10%, and investors from Continental Europe also bought around 10%, he added.

Around 20% was purchased by investors from North America, including from Canada; investors from the Middle East bought less than 10%, he said.

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