Mechel OAO one of the leading Russian mining and steel companies, announces successful placements of its commercial papers of the 15 and 16 series.

On February 22 2011 Mechel OAO completed two placements of its interest bearing commercial papers of the 15 and 16 series with an obligatory centralized custody at MICEX Stock Exchange ZAO. Placement was performed through collection of offers for fixed-price purchase of commercial papers and coupon rate for the first coupon period and before the date of the offer. The papers' maturity is 10 years with the offer in three years.

The number of the commercial papers placed makes 10,000,000 pieces, the nominal value of the papers is RUB 1,000 each and the total nominal value of the placed bonds is RUB 10,000,000,000.

The coupon rate of the commercial papers of the 15 and 16 series for the period until the offer date is 8.25% per year which corresponds to a sum of RUB 41.14.

Coalmetbank OAO, AKB Svyaz Bank OAO, Alfa-Bank OAO, Bank VTB OAO and Sberbank OAO were managers of the placement. Commercial papers of 15 and 16 series are included in MICEX's quotation list A1.

Mr Stanislav Ploschenko Mechel Chief Financial Officer said "This is the first commercial papers placement by a Russian steel and mining company to be done this year. It was done as part of Mechel's strategy on ensuring liquidity for the group's enterprises, optimization of the company loan portfolio by extending the terms of financial obligations and cutting financing costs, as well as funding our investment projects."