... a result of the initial public offering planned by social-networking site Facebook, a VTB Capital report said. Mail.ru Group owns 2.38 percent of Facebook, which said in a filing to U.S. regulators Wednesday that it seeks to raise up to $5 billion in an IPO. According to media reports, the company is hoping for a valuation of $75 billion to $100 billion. Given such a high valuation, the share price of Mail.ru Group could rise 7 percent to 13 percent from its current level, the VTB Capital report said...

... The Internet company, which was evaluating initial public offering plans in June last year, has not yet hired banks to help sell its shares, said the two people, who asked not to be identified because the discussions were private. It may restart the IPO process as soon as the market becomes favorable, the people said. Vkontakte was considering selling shares in New York this year, people familiar with the plans said last June, a move that would have followed the $1.3 billion New York IPO of Yandex...

Yug Rusi, a grain exporter and producer of sunflower oil, is studying an initial public offering after this year, chairman Sergei Kislov said. An IPO may occur in the next five years not counting this year, Kislov said in an interview Thursday. The company has storage capacity of 1.4 million tons, owns 200,000 hectares of farmland and exported 1.5 million tons of grains in the season started July...

... senior vice president for finance Stanislav Ploshenko to analysts in December: “We don’t expect any problems or challenges in implementing this debt repayment program.” A Mechel spokeswoman declined to comment on the possibility of an IPO. Adding to the pressure on the company is a slump in coking coal prices — falling since China cut Australian imports in 2011 — which looks likely to hurt Mechel’s future earnings. An HSBC report in January forecast an average of...

... declines capped the stock's longest losing streak since November. VTB surged as much as 4.3 percent on Feb. 2 after Prime Minister Vladimir Putin told the Moscow-based lender to consider buying back shares from investors who participated in the bank's 2007 IPO. The buyback will be capped at 500,000 rubles ($16,600) per person at the 2007 IPO price of 13.6 kopeks, VTB chief executive Andrei Kostin said late last week. "The initial news of the buyback sparked some hype, but all the speculative money...

... the sidelines of an investment forum. In an obvious pre-election move, Putin, who is running for the presidency next month, proposed Thursday that VTB chairman Andrei Kostin consider buying back equity from participants in the “people’s IPO” to compensate their losses.    The heavily promoted offering, which VTB made in May 2007, attracted $8 billion but left more than 100,000 retail investors in the hole after the company’s shares have slid by nearly 50 percent from the...

Russia's $10 billion sovereign private equity fund is making its first investment, buying a stake in the country's MICEX-RTS stock market with the aim of boosting the exchange's IPO hopes and helping develop Moscow's rudimentary capital markets. Russia’s newest state fund made its first investment on Monday, buying a stake in Moscow’s MICEX-RTS bourse to boost its IPO hopes and compete with big international...

... stake ahead of an initial public offering in 2012 or 2013, its co-founder told Gazeta.ru on Wednesday, as it seeks to cash in on the huge popularity of Russian Internet initial public offerings. "We think it will be possible to proceed with an IPO in 2012 or 2013," Pavel Durov told Gazeta.ru. "We may sell a small stake — about 3 percent — before the IPO in order to increase the market capitalization of the company," he said, adding that there were no ongoing talks to sell the...

... decision by the management," he said. In a populist move, Putin, who runs for the presidency next month, proposed to VTB's head Andrei Kostin last week to consider buying back equity from small investors who participated in the bank's "people's IPO" in 2007 and took a hit after the share price plummeted — which the prime minister attributed to the financial crisis. VTB will make an offer to both individuals and legal entities that participated in the IPO and remained in its shareholders...

... now, the lender's press service said Tuesday. "We expect to reach a deal before late March," Ludkovsky said. In current market conditions, a private placement is preferable to an initial public offering, he said. The company may consider an IPO if a deal isn't reached, Ludkovsky said. Svyaznoi said in August that it may sell as much as 40 percent in an IPO. Svyaznoi is planning to expand to 3,200 outlets this year from 2,700 last year and later focus on expanding high-margin financial services...

... Otkritie's board chairman. Kommersant also reported last week that O1Properties was planning to sell 40 percent to 45 percent of its shares in an initial public offering at the end of 2012. Earlier Russian media reports said the developer planned an IPO in fall 2012. A spokeswoman for O1Properties said by e-mail that the company wasn't commenting on any IPO-related matters. 396846 179742

... share offering in London late last year, but postponed the plans after a sharp drop in its valuation. It now hopes to float the stake in 2012 or 2013. Sovcomflot The 100 percent state-controlled Russian shipping group is expected to be privatized by an IPO some time in 2012 or 2013. The company could raise $750 million to $1.25 billion from the flotation of a 25 percent stake, said sources close to the potential placement in July, while the new government plans state that a 50 percent minus one share...

... net profit was $1.85 billion, a 113.5 percent year-on-year rise. Profit in the third quarter was $607.3 million. The bank's share price has not matched the growth in profits. After the bank's first public offering — an $8 billion "people's IPO" in 2007 — the share price plummeted, reaching one-sixth of its value within a few months and embittering the 120,000 investors who had bought equity. The share price has never recovered. Launched at 14 kopecks a share, it is currently...

... percent, was the first Russian company to sell shares in Hong Kong, raising $2.2 billion in an initial public offering two years ago. His power company EuroSibEnergo also formed a venture with China Yangtze Power last year after postponing a Hong Kong IPO. 179743

... vision of the growth in Internet communications," Dmitry Grishin, Mail.ru Group chief executive, said in a statement. Mail.ru raised about $1 billion in a blockbuster initial public offering in London in November 2010, the second-biggest Russian IPO since the financial crisis behind fellow Internet group Yandex. Social media startups have been popular with investors as the number of Internet users hungry for quick information has continued to grow while Russia became Europe's second-largest Internet...

... itself, according to the minutes of a meeting obtained by Interfax. They also repeated the earlier argument of Deputy Prime Minister Igor Sechin about the risk of selling shares at a price that is lower than the price at which the company carried out its IPO in 2006. Considering all of these factors, as well as the poor market climate, setting a tight deadline in the privatization plan for the government, as represented by Rosneftegaz, to completely withdraw from the capital of Rosneft would not be wise...

... harder, and 30 percent expect no change. Twenty-two percent expect government initiatives (privatizations, possibly) to be a main driver for M&A but also foresee action from "cash-rich corporate acquirers." There is a more positive outlook on IPOs, with 74 percent now expecting an increase versus 43 percent in 2011. 452484 432546

... "expensive" and expects investor enthusiasm for the company to be curbed after a ban on selling shares bought in Yandex's April initial public offering ended in November. "The fact that half its share capital belongs to strategic pre-IPO investors could mean short- to medium-term selling pressure," the analysts wrote. Yandex will retain its 70 percent share of the Russian Internet search market and remain dominant in the sector, according to the note. American depositary receipts...

... the listing, citing unfavorable market conditions. The company planned to list at least 25 percent of its shares. Nord Gold's split-off brings the company's valuation to about $2.7 billion compared with $3 billion to $4 billion ahead of last year's IPO, said Andrei Tretelnikov, an analyst at Rye, Man & Gor Securities. "That means the company has a potential for growth. But it has yet to prove its operational efficiency and the ability to fulfill the ambitious plans it has set," he said...

... soaring thanks to a jocular exchange with the country's leading bankers. VTB shares jumped almost 3 percent after Putin told its chairman, Andrei Kostin, to consider buying back equity from investors who had participated in the bank's 2008 "people's IPO." Kostin, who was in the audience and not on the stage, valued the cost of such a buyback at between 15 billion rubles and 18 billion rubles. As the audience laughed, Putin turned to Sberbank head German Gref and said Russia's biggest lender...