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Siberian Oil Is Being Divided in Sweden
// The Oil Industry
Kommersant has learned that the Swedish company West Siberian Resources Ltd. (WSR), whose only asset is an oil company in Tomsk Region, is embroiled in a corporate dispute connected with the interest of Russian investors in this company. The owners of 23% of WSR's shares have managed to obtain the resignation of the company's general manager and call a meeting of shareholders to replace members of the board of directors. At the same time WSR received an offer from Russian investors to sell its business.
On Wednesday evening WSR (up to June, it was called Vostok Oil Ltd.) issued a statement that its board of directors had received an offer to sell its 100% owned company Vostok Oil (Cyprus) Ltd. for $60 million. This company owns 80% of the shares of the Russian firm OAO Eastern Transnational Company (VTK), the operator of three oilfields on the Sredneyurolsky license area in Tomsk Region. VTK, whose total oil reserves are about 4.5 million tons, with annual production of 100 000 tons, is West Siberian Resources' only asset.
In the opinion of Dmitry Lukashov, an analyst with Aton Investment Group (IG Aton), this is a very good offer. The company has been assessed at $2.30 per barrel of proved reserves. “As a comparison, the current assessment ratio of large Russian oil companies, for example, LUKOIL, is $1.50–2.00 per barrel of proved reserves,” the analyst says.
Orjan Berner, chairman of WSR's board of directors, told Kommersant that the offer came “from a group of Russian investors who are quite experienced but who were previously not concerned with oil”. However, sources close to VTK informed Kommersant that the offer came from Moscow-based ZAO Proektinvest and was signed by its general manager, Aleksandr Rubanov (Mr. Rubanov is also the head of OAO Mezhregion-energo). According to information from Kommersant's sources, Proektinvest represents the interests of a group of investors headed by businessman Alfred Kokh. However, in a conversation with Kommersant yesterday, Mr. Kokh denied reports that he was interested in oil assets in Tomsk Region and Mr. Rubanov refused to comment.
Kommersant's sources connect the appearance of the offer to buy Vostok Oil (Cyprus) with a dispute among WSR shareholders. In April, WSR nearly tripled its charter capital, after which Alltech Investment Ltd. became its largest shareholder (more than 23% of the securities). The new shareholder criticized the company's management for not being aggressive enough in increasing assets and demanded the calling of an extraordinary meeting of shareholders in order to fire WSR's general manager, Frank Hayes, and replace two of the five members of the board of directors (including its current chairman, Mr. Berner).
The extraordinary meeting of WSR shareholders is scheduled for July 7; however, on Monday (June 21), Mr. Hayes published a letter to the company's shareholders, in which he announced his resignation due to disagreements with the new owners. As stated in the letter, these owners are represented on the present board of directors by Maksim Barsky (from Alltech) and Stanford Phelps (from funds owning more than 7% of WSR's shares). Kommersant's sources believe that the present management initiated the offer to sell WSR's business in order to fend off a grab for control.
Yesterday, Maksim Barsky refused to talk to Kommersant about the situation at WSR before the extraordinary shareholders' meeting. He would only acknowledge that he considered the policy of the company's present management “damaging to both the company itself and its shareholders”.
Kommersant will be following the development of events.
Denis Skorobogatko
All the Article in Russian as of June 25, 2004
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Photo: Pavel Kassin