The Milan Stock Exchange yesterday unveiled plans to start its own small cap market for high-growth companies, with three of the first four potential listings in the IT or telecoms sectors. The new exchange is to be called the Nuovo Mercato and reckons to start operating in the third quarter of this year. The choice of name was made to associate it with Euro.NM, the alliance of four small cap markets in Germany, France, Holland and Belgium, to which it will be associated.
The company that operates the Milan exchange, Borsa Italiana, is currently in negotiations with several potential issuers to list on the new market. At the moment, according to a spokesperson for the organization, there are four companies that have gone public with their intention of doing so. One is a biotech company, while the other three are in IT or telecoms.
In IT, one of the companies is a hardware and software distributor, Tecnodiffusione Italia SpA. Another, Gandalf Srl, is a small consultancy in Milan, specializing in interactive marketing. The telecom operator planning a Nuovo Mercato listing is Tiscali SpA, from Cagliari, which offers both fixed telephony services and what it reckons to be Italy’s first free internet service, called Tiscali Freenet.
