A total of 16 companies became public this year, raising a total of 626 mln leva (320.068 mln euros) on the stock exchange (including shares placed by shareholders).

Last week's IPO of Zarneni Hrani Bulgaria, a unit of Chimimport, became the largest one held on the Bulgarian Stock Exchange so far. The value of placed shares topped 192 mln leva (98.168 mln euros). Shareholders offered an additional 42 mln shares, or 25% of capital.

The previous largest IPO was that of First Investment Bank. In May the creditor gathered 176.5 mln leva (90.243 mln euros) from investors, however, shares are currently traded below the IPO price.

Two other IPOs – that of Kaolin and Corporate Commercial bank, were held in the first half of the year and also attracted a lot of attention.

Four initial public offerings took place in the summer, the largest of them (worth almost 20 mln leva) was that of Devin.

Within two of the year's final months 8 companies made their bourse debut. The first one was Trace Group Hold, which was also known with the record 1,480 times oversubscription, the orders worth 32 bln leva (16.361 bln euros), and the numerous sanctions imposed on investment intermediaries by the Financial Supervision Commission.

Enemona's IPO did not go very smooth as well. After an ambiguous shares allotment, the market is expecting trade with the issue to start next year.

The correction on BSE over the past two months, as well as the many IPOs reduced investors' interest, in contrast to large oversubscriptions earlier this year.

Etropal was the only company, which failed to place all shares it offered. The majority shareholder Eurohold Bulgaria held an auction for the sell-off of 28% of the capital in November, but 24% of it went unplaced.

As a whole, 2007 was a very successful year for BSE, in which the interest in the bourse on the part of both the public and companies significantly increased. This is obvious from the great number of initial public offerings, the increasing amount of mutual funds' assets, and the rising number of COBOS certificates.

CompanyIPO MonthValue of places sharesTodoroffApril2.2 mln levaKaolinApril61.8 mln levaCorporate Commercial BankMay58.5 mln levaFirst Investment BankMay176.55 mln levaBianorJuly1.38 mln levaSBSJuly2.29 mln levaDevinJuly19.67 mln levaLomsko PivoJuly2.7 mln levaTrace Group HoldOctober22.1 mln levaEtropalNovember8.61 mln levaHydroizomatNovember4.04 mln levaCBA Asset ManagementNovember14.4 mln levaEnemonaNovember33.6 mln levaAgria Group HoldingDecember15.37 mln levaBillboard December11 mln levaZarneni Hrani BulgariaDecember192.1 mln levaTotal
626.31 mln leva