Russian tanker company listed on the Moscow Stock Exchange

The US$550M raised by SCF’s partial listing has been earmarked for general corporate purposes, including investments in new assets with a focus on industrial projects, decarbonisation and further deleveraging.

The shares are trading under the symbol FLOT on the Moscow Stock Exchange.

SCF Group president and chief executive officer Igor Tonkovidov said “We are pleased to see the level of interest Sovcomflot’s IPO has generated among investors, which underpins the company’s appeal and potential. Through the IPO, we have gained access to equity capital as another source of finance to further advance our business. I am grateful to the Moscow Stock Exchange and all global bookrunners and co-ordinators, VTB Capital, Citi, Sberbank, JP Morgan and Bank of America, for their excellent work on our behalf. I am also very grateful to SCF’s current shareholders for the valuable support towards the company’s ambition to increase its capitalisation and provide efficient means to expand our business for the benefit of all shareholders.

Sberbank CIB managing director and head of capital markets Anton Malkov said “The IPO of Sovcomflot became the first IPO in Russia since 2017 outside the technology sector. The offering has attracted significant interest both from institutional investors, mostly British and Russian, and retail investors.”

The shares were purchased by retail investors with the state Russian Direct Investment Fund (RDIF), Russia’s sovereign wealth fund. Partners from among the leading sovereign wealth funds in the Middle East and Asia have also become anchor investors in the initial public offering of Sovcomflot, supporting the success of the first IPO on the Russian market in 2020.

Russian Direct Investment Fund chief executive Kirill Dmitriev commented “RDIF, the Fund’s leading partners and major international investors have participated in the first IPO on the Russian market in 2020 – an initial public offering of Sovcomflot. This is a clear example of a successful IPO of a Russian company, which has a leading position both in domestic and global markets. RDIF plans to continue attracting partners among the world’s leading sovereign and investment funds to participate in privatisation programmes in the Russian Federation in the future.”

He added, “The privatisation of Sovcomflot will enable the company to actively expand in the key areas of sea energy transportation and seismic exploration. It will also help serve existing Russian and international energy projects more efficiently and participate in the development of new routes, including through the Northern Sea Route and the Arctic zone of the Russian Federation. In addition, the placement will have a positive synergy for the Russian shipbuilding industry, as Sovcomflot is one of the largest civil shipbuilding customers in the Russian Federation.”

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