Moscow, April 24 - Russia's fourth-largest supermarket chain Dixy on Tuesday announced its intention to float shares in Russia, the latest in a rush of Russian retail listings.
Deutsche Bank and Renaissance Capital are joint global bookrunners and joint global coordinators for the issue, and TRUST Investment Bank is co-lead manager, the company said.
Company founder and chairman of board of directors Oleg Leonov said the IPO would help finance Dixy's growth.
Market sources said Dixy was hoping to raise $300-$400 million in the listing on Russia's RTS and MICEX stock exchanges. Final pricing is expected around mid-May.
Russia's retail food market is a hotbed of IPO activity. Russians, hungry for consumer goods after the deprivation of the Soviet era, are spending as never before as petrodollars flow into the world's second-biggest oil exporter.
The market has come a long way since the Soviet Union collapsed in 1991, when it was extremely basic. Now food retailers forecast profit growth of between 30 and 50 percent a year.
By 2020, Russia is projected to surpass France and Germany as the largest food and grocery market in Europe.
The grocery market so far is fragmented, with the top five food retailers controlling just 5 percent of sales, according to a report by Standard & Poor's.
Discounters including Dixy rule the market with their aggressive prices and account for about 40 percent of retail turnover.
Dixy had 333 stores as of April 15, 2007, according to its statement. In 2006, it had consolidated revenue of $1 billion and gross profit of $210 million, the statement said.