Sberbank working on more than 10 initial public share offerings, some expected before year-end

VLADIVOSTOK. Sept 5 (Interfax) - Sberbank is currently working on initial public share offerings for more than 10 companies, with some of them possible in the coming months, Sberbank Deputy CEO Anatoly Popov said.

"At current interest rates, institutional investors and retail players prefer fixed-income instruments, but forthcoming monetary easing will set the scene for a revival of the IPO market in Russia. Investors will begin to look for opportunities in the stock market, reducing positions in deposits and public debt instruments, including OFZ bonds and money market funds," Popov told reporters on the sidelines of the Eastern Economic Forum.

Sber is working on initial share offerings for more than 10 companies, "almost half of which are expected in the second half of 2025," Popov said.

Popov said a window for transactions on the equity capital market often opened after a first successful placement. In his opinion, one such "successful precedent" might be the DOM.RF IPO planned for the fall, and co-organized by Sber.

In 2024, the Russian equity capital market saw 19 deals (15 IPOs and 4 SPOs) totaling more than 100 billion rubles. However, amid the tightening of monetary policy, market activity began to gradually decline last year and has practically stalled this year. Since the beginning of the year, only one small initial placement has taken place - JetLend Holding, owner of the JetLend crowdfunding platform, conducted an IPO on the SPB Exchange with a volume of around 500 million rubles.