Some years ago, the words IPO and Russia took on the dynamic of water against oil, as numerous Russian firms, often with the Kremlin’s guiding hand, failed to meet basic accounting standards in order to raise funds on key global markets such as the London Stock Exchange.  First we had the fiasco surrounding Rosneft and its questioned ownership of expropriated Yukos assets, then the multi-year campaign from Rusal to list in London, only to eventually go to Hong Kong for a $2.2 billion listing, and now today we have some more interesting news.

The Financial Times is reporting that Vladimir Potanin’s group Prof Media and Interros are shelving their plans for an April IPO in London which could have raised $1 billion, while Alisher Usmanov’s group Metalloinvest is also reconsidering plans to put 20% of its shares on the market.