The WSE's Scandinavian suitor

The Warsaw Stock Exchange (WSE) is holding advanced talks on adopting of the OMX trading system, Deputy Treasury Minister Michał Chyczewski told Reuters. The transaction system is used by around 50 bourses, including the Nordic Exchange, Moscow's MICEX, Austria's Wiener Börse and the Zagreb Stock Exchange.

The OMX system will not be adopted before the WSE is privatized, however. "The most important project for us is the privatization," the president of the bourse, Ludwik Sobolewski, told Parkiet daily.

Chyczewski said that the decision to contract the transaction system would require careful consideration because it could prevent the Polish bourse from finding a strategic investor for its privatization. He remarked that the Warsaw exchange could be privatized in Q2 of this year through the sale of a stake to institutional investors. Another stake would be floated on the bourse itself.

"About 30 percent would go to institutional investors, and between 10 and 20 percent would end up in a public offer," Chyczewski said. While the Treasury Ministry will retain a controlling stake of 51 percent, it did not rule out the possibility of selling a further stake in the future.

Plans to privatize the WSE first appeared in 2004 in the Capital Market Development Strategy-Agenda Warsaw City 2010.

According to Marcin Bogucki, an analyst with brokerage IDMSA, a trend towards consolidation is visible among stock exchanges and the WSE will soon have to enter a partnership or risk being taken over.

"The WSE cannot walk on its own forever," he said.

The negotiations with OMX are a sign that the WSE might enter into closer cooperation with that region, Bogucki said, stressing that this move is not binding for any of the parties. "It's not a marriage proposal," he told WBJ.