Russia’s Ozon Sees Shares Soar 40 Pct In US IPO, Raising $1B

Shares of Russian eCommerce titan Ozon soared 40 percent in the first few minutes of its American IPO on Tuesday, raising $1 billion.

Ozon’s American debut has been hotly anticipated. The company, which is often referred to as the Russian Amazon, is the first Russian company to hold an IPO on the U.S. markets since 2014.

Shares of Ozon (Nasdaq: OZON) were most recently trading at $40 a share, down 0.5 percent from Tuesday’s close.

According to The Moscow Times, Ozon’s American depositary shares, or ADSs, were sold to IPO subscribers for $30 apiece, significantly above the $22.50 to $27.50 range that the company had estimated in its prospectus earlier this month. Post-IPO, the company is now valued at around $7 billion.

The Moscow Times said that initial trading of the stock on Nasdaq was delayed, allowing Russian investors trading on the Moscow market, where Ozon is also listed, to push up shares over 30 percent. Russian regulators had prohibited non-professional investors from taking part in the IPO.

Ozon, founded 22 years ago, is believed to have raised $1 billion from the IPO and a private sale of shares to existing investors.

According to a U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) filing, Ozon planned to issue 34.5 million shares on the Nasdaq stock exchange.

Ozon’s main shareholders are the Baring Vostok investment fund and Sistema, a conglomerate controlled by businessman Vladimir Yevtushenkov, Barron’s reported. The companies were expected to purchase additional shares worth $135 million.

Previous news reports had pegged the value of Ozon’s IPO at anywhere between $500 million and $750 million.

Ozon’s revenues have soared since it opened its online marketplace in 2018. Fueled by pandemic shopping, sales volumes have more than doubled during the past year, The Moscow Times said.

The newspaper also noted that while the U.S. online market is dominated by Amazon, the Russian market is far more fragmented, with five of its largest eCommerce companies claiming only 25 percent of the market. Major players include Wildberries, Russian’s largest eCommerce retailer; Yandex; AliExpress Russia, a Russian version of China’s Alibaba; Citilink; and MVideo.