Euromoney Names Dragon Capital Best Equity House in Ukraine
Kyiv, September 10, 2002 – The British financial magazine Euromoney has named the Kyiv-based investment bank Dragon Capital the best equities house in Ukraine in its 2002 Awards for Excellence Survey.
The prestigious award from one of the world’s leading magazines covering world capital and money markets highlights Dragon’s rapid ascension from a newcomer to Ukraine’s capital markets just two years ago to the country’s leading investment bank today.
In its special Awards edition, Euromoney pointed out a wide scope of Dragon’s brokerage services and reliability of its KP-Dragon Index, launched together with the Kyiv Post, Ukraine’s English language newspaper, in 2000.
“Dragon Capital takes the award for best equities house, not just because it is a full service brokerage with extensive equity research coverage taking in all the major Ukrainian companies, but also because of its work in developing the KP-Dragon Index … This is the first reliable index in the Ukrainian market,” Euromoney wrote.
Euromoney’s latest Awards for Excellence, which are announced annually, encompass over 80 countries. Besides Ukraine, other former Soviet republics surveyed by the London-based magazine this year include Russia, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyz Republic, and Uzbekistan. Euromoney named Merrill Lynch the world’s best equities house and Citigroup the world’s most improved equities house.
“Euromoney’s rankings are the most recognized worldwide. The fact that they are based on a survey of leading financial and strategic investors makes us proud that we have attained our goal to provide superior quality services for our clients,” said Tomas Fiala, Dragon’s Managing Director. “Our award also proves that first-class financial services can be provided in a very challenging environment, such as Ukraine’s.”
Dragon Capital was founded in Kyiv in spring 2000 by a group of investment professionals with experience in Ukraine and other Central and Eastern European markets. Besides growing into the major player in Ukraine’s stock market, today Dragon Capital is also one of the largest investment banks in Ukraine in terms of corporate finance services.
The company has managed M&A and privatization transactions for such multinational giants as Bongrain, Interbrew, and RusAl. Currently, Dragon is working on more than a dozen new M&A and privatization deals for foreign and domestic investors.
It is symptomatic that Euromoney, which did not consider the Best Equities House award for Ukraine in 2001, returned the accolade this year, just as Ukraine’s stock market, depressed by the fallout from the 1998 crisis in Russia, has staged a dramatic rebound. The KP-Dragon Index, which tracks the 10 most liquid Ukrainian stocks, has risen by over 50% since the beginning of the year, reflecting Ukraine’s strong macroeconomic fundamentals and growing attention toward the country among foreign investors.
Taking avail of the improving environment, in March Dragon Capital entered into a cooperation agreement with Auerbach Grayson & Company Inc. of New York to become the only investment company in Ukraine with access to a wide network of U.S. institutional clients. Dragon’s agreement with Auerbach yielded its first results already in July, when the two investment banks organized a successful road show in the United States for Ukrnafta, Ukraine’s largest oil company and the country’s top blue chip.
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