Uniper shares rise following stock market debut

Uniper shares have risen in the first morning of trading after the newly formed company was floated on the Frankfurt stock exchange.

The stock market debut marks the completion of the spin-off of Eon’s conventional power generation and energy trading operations into a separate company.

Eon shareholders were allocated 53.35 per cent of Uniper shares when the split was officially registered in Germany on Friday. They received one Uniper share for every ten shares they owned in Eon.

The two companies have effectively been operationally independent since Uniper came into being at the beginning of this year.

Uniper is not listed in the main indices on the Frankfurt stock exchange, unlike its parent company Eon which is listed on the blue chip index DAX. This is likely to have provided some downward pressure on Uniper’s share price, as indices trackers offloaded their newly created stocks.

Nevertheless, after being floated in an opening auction at a price of €10.015, the shares gained ground over the first half of the day. At the time of publication, they were trading at €10.538 – valuing the company at around €3.85 billion. 

Speaking ahead of the floatation Eon chief executive Johannes Teyssen said: “Eon and Uniper now have every opportunity to be successful with their clear focus on their respective segments of the energy industry. They can now develop without compromises and serve the needs of their respective customers.

“This strategy is the right way forward for Eon, for Uniper and for the customers, shareholders and employees of both companies. The new and the classical energy worlds are so fundamentally different that they each require a totally different entrepreneurial approach.”

Eon shares dropped 13 per cent in the first half an hour of trading this morning from €8.12 to €7.10. It meant the company’s value fell by around €2 billion to roughly €13.85 billion. At the time of publication, the shares had fallen further to €7.05.