Lithuania's Ignitis raises EUR 450m in IPO

Lithuanian renewables-focused utility Ignitis Group, or AB Ignitis grupe, on Friday priced its initial public offering (IPO) in both Vilnius and London at EUR 22.50 apiece, thus securing gross proceeds of EUR 450 million (USD 529m).

The company is selling both ordinary shares and global depository receipts (GDRs) in two tranches at the same price per unit. More specifically, it has allocated a total of 20 million shares to institutional and retail investors.

The price range for the IPO was previously set at EUR 22.5 to EUR 28 per share. The final pricing puts Ignitis’ market capitalisation at about EUR 1.67 billion.

UK-based institutional investors account for a third of the overall demand and the rest comes from the Baltics, the Nordics, Continental Europe and others. The European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD), in particular, has acquired EUR 67.5 million worth of shares to become Ignitis’ largest minority shareholder.

Lithuania’s Ministry of Finance continues to be the company’s majority shareholder with a stake of 73.1%.

"Ignitis Group's IPO is an ice breaker in the Lithuanian capital market - becoming the largest transaction in the Baltics in the last couple of decades. I trust that this ice will not form again soon, because Lithuanian, Latvian, Estonian retail investors, pension funds and institutional investors have received a lot of attention during this IPO. Meeting all the demand from local investors suggests that the activity in stock trading in local markets will rise significantly," commented finance minister Vilius Sapoka.

Ignitis reiterated it will use the proceeds from the IPO to facilitate its growth, which would include investing in its Networks business and in the Green Generation segment.

The company’s stock will be admitted to trading on the Main Trading List of Nasdaq Vilnius under the ticker symbol "IGN1L" on October 7. The GDRs will begin trading on the London Stock Exchange (LSE) on the same date under the symbol “IGN”.

(EUR 1.0 = USD 1.175)

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