THE SIJ GROUP SUCCESSFULLY COMPLETES THE FOURTH CONSECUTIVE ISSUE OF COMMERCIAL PAPERS TO THE VALUE OF EUR 27.3 MILLION

Ljubljana, Friday, 15 December 2017 – The SIJ Group has completed its fourth consecutive issue of commercial papers, to the value of EUR 27,325,000.

With the payments made today, the SIJ Group has successfully completed the fourth consecutive issue of commercial papers, to the value of EUR 27,325,000. The commercial papers have a maturity of one year. The date of maturity is 14 December 2018. At 1.10% p.a., the interest rate is the lowest of any achieved for commercial papers issued on the Slovenian capital market. The interest shown by institutional and private investors clearly demonstrates their trust in the competitive position and stability of the SIJ Group and the successful implementation of its development strategy for the future.

The papers were issued for the purpose of optimizing financing costs and spreading the current financing resources. Issued in dematerialized form, the commercial papers are registered in the central registry maintained by KDD – the Central Securities Clearing Corporation d. d., Ljubljana, under the code SIK04 and the ISIN code SI0032501965. They will be listed on the regulated market of the Ljubljana Stock Exchange. The accumulated assets will enable the SIJ Group to pay off last year's issue of commercial papers and provide adequate liquidity sources to balance its seasonal working capital requirements.

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The SIJ Group is the largest Slovenian vertically integrated metallurgist group, ranked among the top market positions in the European and world niche steel markets. In addition to metallurgy (its core business), the SIJ Group is also involved in the food industry (the Perutnina Ptuj Group) and employs close to 7,500 people in Slovenia and abroad. Generating EUR 512.4 million in revenues (a 23.8% increase compared to the same period last year) in the first half of 2017, the SIJ Group exceeded the EUR 0.5 billion threshold for the first time in its history. The EBITDA of EUR 55.9 million is comparable to the same period last year.