On December 2, 2011, the Ukrainian Chamber of Commerce and Industry hosted the second international conference "Ukrainian IPO-meetings 2011." By tradition DAGDA acted as the organizer of the. The conference was attended by potential issuers contemplating IPO decisions, the representatives of stock exchanges from Germany, Switzerland and Ukrainian asset management companies, leading executives of investment firms and banks, financial and legal advisors, as well as government representatives.

The event focused on issues related to the preparation of the initial public offering (IPO), opportunities for the IPO of Ukrainian companies in foreign markets and market analysis of depositary receipts. Conference participants debated the main requirements for listing on the major foreign stock exchanges, as well as analyzed the global market for initial public offerings and general trends in the markets of Central and Eastern Europe.

Yulia Kyrpa, counsellor with Vasil Kisil & Partners banking practice and a regular expert of the annual research report «IPO from A to Z: a handbook for the issuer" (organized by DAGDA) delivered a presentation on "Jurisdiction Shopping for IPO”.

According to Ms. Kyrpa, Ukrainian legislation contains a number of limitations that prevent the placement of shares of Ukrainian companies outside of Ukraine. "These restrictions are related to a set of provisions of the joint-stock company law, which specifies that shares of the Ukrainian issuers must be denominated in national currency and contains several provisions related to pre-emptive rights of shareholders, etc. In addition, the currency legislation of Ukraine is totally unattractive, and any placement outside of Ukraine requires a permission from the Securities Commission ", - said Yulia. Given these problems and challenges no Ukrainian company has been able to accomplish a direct IPO in foreign jurisdictions just yet. Therefore Ukrainian issuers are faced with issue of jurisdiction shopping”, - summed up Ms. Kyrpa.

Among the possible ways to access foreign capital markets available to Ukrainian issuers Yulia pointed out the issue of global depositary receipts or American depositary receipts, the creation of a holding company that controls shares of Ukrainian companies de facto, as well as the use of alternative structures entering the public equity markets (the reverse takeover procedure) which are used when entering the U.S. stock markets.
You can access Yulia’s presentation by clicking here.

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For more details please contact Iryna Ryslyaeva,
PR Manager
Tel.: +380 44 581 7777
E-mail: pr@vkp.kiev.ua
About the Firm

Established in 1992, Vasil Kisil & Partners is a Ukrainian law firm that delivers integrated legal advice in banking & finance, mergers & acquisitions, capital markets,  antitrust, competition and trade, dispute resolution, tax law, energy and natural resources law, intellectual property law, labor and employment law, real estate and construction law, as well as PPP, concessions and infrastructure law.

VKP serves international and domestic companies, as well as private individuals, dealing with banking and financial industry sectors, agriculture, chemical, construction, energy, hi-tech, general commodities, insurance, IT, media, metallurgy, pharmaceutical, real estate, shipbuilding, telecommunications, trading, transport, and other industries and economy sectors.

The firm`s clients include such world-known companies as Alpcot Agro, Africa-Israel Group, Astellas Pharma, BASF, Bayer Consumer, BNP Paribas, British American Tobacco, Central European Media Enterprises, Coca Cola, Credit Agricole Group, Danone, Dell Inc., Du Pont, Energy Standard Group, Eurosport, Google, IKB Deutsche Industriebank , LG Electronics, Leroy Merlin Ukraine, Lukoil, Metso Automation Oy, Moody’s, Mott MacDonald Limited, NCH Capital, Novacke chemicke zavody, Opel, Philips, Pioneer, Red Bull, Russian Standard Bank, St. Sophia Homes, SEB AB, SEB Group, Swedbank AB, Seven Hills, Shell, Standard Charted Bank, Tchibo, UniCredit Group, Vanco International / Vanco Energy, Volkswagen, VympelCom.