Evraz to list on LSE

Russian steel company Evraz will soon become the latest Russian company to offer shares on the London Stock Exchange.

The company is expected to raise between $393 million and $495 million with its initial public offering, which is expected to start trading shortly after June 1. The listing comes at a time when steel prices seem to have reached a peak and are on the way down.

Evraz plans to use the capital raised from the sale to make improvements to plants and mills, and to pursue acquisitions at home and abroad. The company recently purchased a manganese mine in the Caucasus , in Georgia, and has indicated interest in bidding on a steel plant in the Czech Republic.

Evraz will sell 29.1 million global depository receipts (GDRs) in a holding company based in Luxembourg. Each GDR will be priced between $13.5 and $17, and three GDRs will equal one share in the company.

This puts the market value of the company at somewhere between $4.7 billion and $6 billion. The founder and chief executive of Evraz, Alexander Abramov, is believed to own around 65 percent of shares in the company.

Evraz is following a recent trend for Russian companies to list in London. Conglomerate Sistema completed a listing in February, while Russia’s largest grocery retailer, Pyaterochka, listed earlier in May.

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