The St. Petersburg Stock Exchange has announced the establishment of the international-level International Exchange St. Petersburg (IXSP) in an effort to increase its attractiveness after the loss of its monopoly right to trade in Gazprom stock at the end of 2005, when it lost half of its profitability. The British venture company RX and the North European OMX stock exchange are also serving as founders of the new trading space. All three founders will have equal shares.

The St. Petersburg Stock Exchange is the third largest in Russia, after the MICEX and RTS in Moscow. It was established in 1991 and mainly trades in Gazprom stock. Brent oil and currency (euro and dollar cross-rate) are also traded on it. OMX is an international stock exchange group that cooperates with more than 60 exchanges in 50 countries. Its capitalization at the beginning of the year was ˆ770 billion.

Alexey Sergeev, deputy general director of the St. Petersburg Exchange, said that the biggest advantage the new exchange will offer investors is the ability to trade on foreign exchanges without undergoing listing procedures outside of Russia. Niklas Lilja, OMX head of information, said that trading will take place on the electronic Sucses system, an analog of the NASDAQ terminal.

The St. Petersburg Stock Exchange made a net profit of 25.8 million rubles in the first nine months of 2006, as compared to 48.6 million rubles in the same period of the previous year. Vladimir Kuptsov, executive director of the Fourth Dimension financial company, estimated that the founders of the new exchange paid $100-200 million to set it up.

News source: www.kommersant.com
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