Poland announced the flotation of the Warsaw Stock Exchange (WSE) on Thursday, a symbolic post-communist step for the country as well as the market, now the biggest in central Europe. The sale of the company and its listing on November 9 is expected to draw strong investor interest, officials said.
The flotation of the WSE, on its own market, will be historic and "crown 20 years of economic transformation" in Poland since the fall of communism in 1989, Treasury Minister Aleksander Grad said. "I think there will be great interest in the WSE," Grad told reporters minutes after the WSE share offer prospectus was made public.
The WSE is the jewel in Poland's privatisation drive which aims to raise 25 billion zloty (6.36 billion euros, 8.2 billion dollars) in order to cap a public deficit ballooning up to 7.0 percent of Gross Domestic Product this year, more than double the European Union limit of 3.0 percent. The Treasury, which holds 98.8 percent of the WSE, plans to sell nearly 64 percent or 26.8 million shares, retaining strategic control with 35 percent of the exchange.
"Investors have the opportunity to become shareholders in the largest national exchange ... in central and eastern Europe (and) ... which has the greatest development and growth dynamic in Europe," WSE chairman Ludwik Sobolewski said in a joint statement with the Treasury. Individual investors can subscribe October 18-27 for up to 30 percent of the shares in the overall initial public offering (IPO), the statement said.