2 Major Firms to Make Debut at TSE This Month

A drug maker and an oil company, slated to go public this month (the Iranian month that started on Nov. 21), will be the vanguard of 37 listings planned by Tehran Stock Exchange for the next six months.

Barekat Pharmaceutical Group and Jey Oil Refining Company will each sell a 10% stake on Tehran Stock Exchange, Esmaeil Dargahi, TSE's listing deputy, was quoted as saying by Boursepress.

The economy is showing signs of improvement after nuclear sanctions were lifted in January. These have prompted the exchange's executives to get a TSE listing for various companies.

The exchange is preparing for a huge wave of initial public offerings, Securities and Exchange News Agency reported.

Forty companies will join the exchange, 37 of which will offer shares to the public for the first time. The companies will be accepted into the exchange before the end of March, though the actual IPOs will take longer to complete.

The listing of these companies will diversify the exchange's portfolio of companies, TSE executives claim and carve out a place for new industry groups like investment banks.

The first of this wave will be Barekat Pharmaceutical Group and Jey Oil Refining Company. The latter is the largest bitumen producer in Iran that works with Isfahan Refinery and claims to export 80% of its products.

Barekat is one of Iran's largest pharmaceutical holding companies with more than 20 subsidiaries and claims to control 14% of Iran's pharmaceutical market. It is wholly owned by EIKO—the Execution of Imam Khomeini's Order, a charity organization with multi-sector business holdings.

According to Dargahi, the exchange is also reviewing Ghadir Electricity and Energy, a subsidiary of giant conglomerate Ghadir Investment Company, in the next two weeks. Ghadir investment company's majority shareholders are a consortium of the Armed Forces pension and insurance organizations.

Dargahi added that Pars Energy-Gostar Drilling and Exploration Company's request for listing will also be reviewed, though he gave no timeframe for the review.

PEDEX is wholly owned by Mostazafan Foundation of Islamic Revolution. It started as a construction company 35 years ago and moved to upstream petroleum services 18 years later by winning a contract for developing three gas fields.