Interia share issue oversubscribed, raising zl.37.8 mn

Interia, the first Internet portal in Central and Eastern Europe to conduct an initial public offering (IPO), saw its shares hugely oversubscribed, with an allocation rate of just 13.36%. At a special stock exchange session, 719,186 shares of Poland's third largest portal were offered to individual investors for zl.23 each, raising zl.16.54 million. Interia stands to gain a further zl.21.26 million from the issue of 880,184 shares to selected institutional investors, with results to be announced on Thursday. The share price values the 25% stake being offered at $9 million. Each of the newly offered shares has just one fifth of the voting rights of those held by the portal's main shareholders - systems integrator ComArch and radio station RMF FM. Several other portals, including Arena and Hoga.pl, are keeping a close eye on the Interia issue, having already filed their issue prospectuses with the Securities and Exchange Commission (KPWiG). However, the two most popular Internet gateways, Wirtualna Polska and onet.pl, have no public offering plans. (Gazeta Wyborcza, p.19, Reuters) T.J.