Electrica‘s shares start trading on BVB and London Stock Exchange

Electrica's shares made their stock market debut with a slight increase over the final price corresponding to the recently closed initial public offering. In the first day of trading on the Bucharest Stock Exchange (BVB) and the London Stock Exchange (LSE) where securities are available in the form of Global Depository Receipts, the open price reported by the BVB went up to 11.11 lei per share, compared to the final offer price of 11 lei and 10.45 lei, respectively, for retail investors benefitting from the discounted securities. A marginal increase was also recorded in the price of the GDRs traded on the LSE which indicates a price range of 13.70 to 13.80 dollar per GDR, while the offer price was 13.66 dollar per GDR.

The latest results on the BVB where Electrica’s securities were included on the regulated market, on the Equity Sector, Tier 1, show that the price of its shares is on the rise, though, with a high price of 11.26 lei and an average of 11.17 lei per share.  Since the opening of today’s trading session, the stock exchange has recorded nearly 2,300 transactions with a combined value of 37 million lei (some 8.4 million euro).

The company’s listing follows the successful closing on June 25 of an IPO for 51.2 percent of its share capital, after a capital increase. Electrica’s flotation raised 1.95 billion lei (about 444 million euro) after selling 177.2 million securities in the form of shares and GDRs, with one GDR being equivalent to four shares. The securities sold in the largest-ever IPO run on the BVB were divided between 11,613 investors who purchased 142 million shares and around 8.8 million GDRs.

Institutional investors bought 79 percent of the securities sold in the IPO, while the rest of 21 percent was acquired by retail investors to whom were reallocated 6 percent more securities compared to the initial tranche. The European Bank for Reconstruction and Development has invested over 320 million lei (some 75 million euro) for an 8.6 percent stake in Electrica and has become the second largest shareholder of the company, after the Romanian state which controls the majority stake of 48.8 percent upon completion of the offering. ING, which placed subscription orders through several entities, part of the financial group, is the other major investor in Electrica, acquiring the third biggest stake in the IPO.

Electrica is the leading distributor and supplier of electricity in the domestic market. The group's core business segments are the supply and distribution of electricity which is the largest one in the domestic market both in terms of volume of electricity distributed to users and number of users.  According to ANRE, the National Energy Regulatory Authority, in 2013 the Electrica’s distribution business accounted for 39 percent of the electricity distributed in Romania – some 16 TWh of electric power which was distributed to about 3.6 million users. The supply operations included a similar number of users (around 3.56 million) and 9.7 TWh which represents 22.1 percent of the electric power supplied in the country.

Last year, Electrica posted consolidated revenues of approximately 5.2 billion lei (over 1.15 billion euro), while EBITDA amounted to 749 million lei (some 167 million euro).