Moscow-based Renaissance Capital could lay claim to being the first non-western broker-investor to recognize the interconnected power of the world’s emerging markets.
RenCap ploughed into Africa in the mid-2000s, branching out into Europe and parts of Asia. In so doing, it has patched together a brokerage that claims to be, in the words of Alexander Merzlenko, deputy CEO and head of Russia and CIS investment banking, the world’s "leading emerging market-focused global player".
So do such claims stack up? In part, they do. Few global players have shown an inclination to venture into Africa’s hairier reaches. RenCap has six offices across the continent, and offers probably the best sub-Saharan Africa research around.
And rather like Martini, it is also willing to try any type of capital markets deal: anytime and anywhere.
So in 2011 it completed a $70 million rights issue for Zambian Breweries, advised on the $750 million sale of Zimbabwe Iron & Steel to India’s Essar Group, underwrote the $142.5 million Hong Kong flotation of China Polymetallic Mining, and helped Sydney-listed African Iron buy a large stretch of Congolese iron ore.
