OMV Petrom shareholders approve London listing

By bne IntelliNews September 23, 2015

bne IntelliNews -

 

Shareholders of Romanian oil and gas company OMV Petrom, part of the Austrian group OMV, have approved the secondary listing of the company’s shares on the London Stock Exchange. 

At an extraordinary general shareholders meeting on September 22, shareholders holding 72.7% of the company’s share capital approved the secondary listing by the issuance of GDRs for existing shares.

The secondary listing was asked for by Fondul Proprietatea, which has a 19% stake in OMV Petrom and which wants to sell at least part of its shares. Its request was supported by the main owner of OMV Petrom, Austrian group OMV, which holds a 51% stake.

“We see the benefits of GDR listing in increased visibility of OMV Petrom and higher total trading liquidity, with a positive impact on the shareholders,” an OMV spokesperson commented.

Fondul Proprietatea said the listing would diversify the shareholder base and increase coverage from foreign brokerage houses.

Fondul Proprietatea has proposed to its shareholders to reduce its participation in OMV Petrom by at least 4%, from 19% currently. ​It also announced that it was considering the option of cutting its stake below 15%, including by the public offering of shares and GDRs, conditioned on the market circumstances and necessary permits from the market regulators.

Fondul Proprietatea itself made a secondary listing on the LSE in April. Its London listing followed the recent IPOs of two major Romanian companies: electricity distribution company Electrica in 2014 and gas company Romgaz in 2013.

On April 9, Romania’s Financial Supervisory Authority  announced it had approved a new regulation allowing local issuers to carry out secondary listings on foreign exchanges using depositary interest instruments, finally opening the way for Fondul Proprietatea  and other companies to go ahead with their LSE listings.The Bucharest Stock Exchange has expressed concern over the potential risk of the migration of transactions for strategic Romanian companies from Bucharest to London.

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