Rosimuschestvo approves Transneft share split at ratio of 1 to 100

MOSCOW. Nov 15 (Interfax) - Russia's Federal Property Management Agency (Rosimuschestvo) has approved the split of Transneft shares at a ratio of 1 to 100, the Russian oil pipeline operator said in a statement.

The number of ordinary shares after the split will be 569,446,800, and the number of preferred shares will be 155,487,500.

Earlier, Gennady Shmal, a member of the Transneft board, told Interfax that the topic of the split was discussed at a meeting of the board committee on August 29, and a decision was made to support the proposal of the administration and the company's management to split the shares. "The stock is very expensive, who can buy such shares? Perhaps one, two, or three. That is why we decided in the proposal that was formulated at the committee meeting to propose that the Transneft board endorse a split, to reduce the cost a hundred times. If now, nominally, it is 120,000 rubles, then it will be 1,200 rubles. This will make it possible to more widely attract ordinary citizens [to Transneft shares]. Therefore, this is topical," he said.

All of Transneft's ordinary shares are owned by the state, while preferred shares are traded on the market.

This is the most expensive (in absolute terms) share on the Russian stock market among liquid securities, currently costing 147,300 rubles, with trading volume on Wednesday totaling 2.3 billion rubles.