Special report I 73
bne 2015 bne February May 2008
Special Report: Capital Markets Survey 2014
2014 in CEE/CIS proves rich in risk, relatively poor in reward Guy Norton in Zagreb
2
014 proved to be an extremely testing one for issuers, lead managers and investors in the Central and Eastern Europe/Commonwealth of Independent States (CEE/CIS) region, dominated as it was by the political-economic fallout from the bitter standoff between the US and Europe on the one side and Russia on the other side over the bloody events in Ukraine. Add in one-off fears about the general health of the global economy, the plummeting price of oil, uncertainty over the continued use of quantitative easing and renewed concerns over the fate of the embattled Greek economy, and the capital markets environment in 2014 ultimately proved to be as challenging as when the credit crunch and associated global economic slowdown hit home in 2008-2009. As such issuers, lead managers and investors in CEE/CIS had to have their
wits about them if they were to be successful. Arguably a crystal ball-like ability to read which way the political winds were blowing and having nerves of steel proved to be every bit as important as
mark initial public offering (IPO) at a time of rising chaos in Ukraine paid off for the selling shareholders in Russian supermarket chain Lenta, which yielded the largest equity market issue of
“2014 ultimately proved to be as challenging as when the credit crunch and associated global economic slowdown hit home in 2008-2009� having a strong credit story to tell when it came to capital markets success. Equity According to information supplied by Dealogic, nowhere was that more true than in the equity markets, where the decision to press ahead with a land-
the year from the region. On the basis that fortune favours the brave, bookrunners Credit Suisse, JPMorgan, VTB Capital, Deutsche Bank and UBS were arguably vindicated in their decision to proceed with a deal, which although it just failed to achieve the landmark issue volume of $1bn, did neverthe-