The TNK-BP board of directors approved capital investments for this year of $4.4 billion and shareholders' dividends of $1.93 billion for the first half of the year.
Photo: Sergey Mikheev
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TNK-BP Board Meets Peacefully
The first meeting of the board of directors of TNK-BP Holding since the owners of the company settled their dispute at the beginning of the month. They had been in conflict since the beginning of the year. The board approved capital investments for this year of $4.4 billion. The Russian owners of the company had been insisting on lower investments, but compromised with their British partners after the British agreed to the changes in the company’s management demanded by the Russians. Shareholders in the company will receive dividends of $1.93 billion for the first half of the year.
TNK-BP Ltd. is owned in equal parts by the British oil company BP and the AAR consortium, made up of Mikhail Fridman, Viktor Vekselberg and Leonard Balavatnik. TNK-BP Ltd. owns TNK-BP Holding. Because of the shareholders’ conflict, the company had operated all year without an investment program. The Russians can be considered the winners in the conflict, since all of their conditions for the management of the company were met. The Russians agreed to the BP’s proposed investment program, however. Previously, they had wanted a program of $3.5 billion.
The Russians had argued that the $900 million between their proposed sums would be used to build up TNK-BP’s reserves, not to increase its production or expand its business, and that step was unnecessary, since TNK-BP already has reserves for 16 years. Western oil companies only have reserves for 12.5 years. The British claimed that their proposed investment program would allow for a production increase that would not be possible without increasing reserves.
www.kommersant.com
All the Article in Russian as of Sep. 26, 2008
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