Nornickel Reserves Place in City
// But is in no hurry to purchase its shares
Office construction
Yesterday, Norilsk Nickel announced that a group of companies had acquired 32 percent shares of City on its behalf. New owners say that the main goal of the purchase is to guarantee space in the future business center. The transaction will be completed only after the asset had been evaluated, but former owner of the stock Yury Shefler says that in any case he is out of the project.
Norilsk Nickel major shareholders are Interros President Vladimir Potanin and Nornickel general director Mikhail Prokhorov, each owning at least 25 percent. Overall Interros controls as much 62.5 percent shares of the Nornickel.
City was founded in 1992 to realize the construction of the international business center Moskva-City. It is the managing company of the project, receiving 1-2 percent from the sale of section construction contracts, and owns assets of companies located on its territory. As many as 32 percent shares belong to Guta Group, and about 32 percent were owned by SPI, which belonged to vodka magnate Yury Shefler.
In December 2004 Guta and SPI announced that they would manage the company together. However, yesterday it became known that Shefler’s stock had been sold. SPI member of the board Andrey Skurikhin told Kommersant: “We decided to leave this project and sold our stock to structures acting on behalf of Norilsk Nickel.” The company’s press service confirmed that their mediators had bought 32 percent shares from City shareholders, and Oleg Baibakov, manager of Nornickel affairs had been already appointed as City president. Both parties refused to name the cost of the transaction, saying it was a commercial secret.
SPI representative said the reason of their refusal to participate in the project was their decision to get rid of nonspecialized assets. “We have our own specialty – international trade and alcohol. Having sold our shares in City, we are able to concentrate on our own business, which is our first priority and which we think to be more promising,” Skurikhin said. Nornickel deputy head of public relations Elena Kovaleva told Kommersant: “We are interested in developing the largest business center, and in receiving space in it,” however, she emphasized the transaction had not been concluded yet. She said that Nornickel would evaluate the asset, and that the final decision would be made after the examination is over. According to the source close to the transaction’s circles, the stock cost SPI $15 million, and will be offered to Nornickel for $60 million.
In August of last year Nornickel got rid of its property by selling NOMOS Bank its only office complex in Moscow for $12 million. At that time Otkrytye Investitsii, owned by Interros, said they would only take on large class A projects with large sector areas and modern communications. Obviously, Moskva-City, must have been large enough of a project to have interested Interros and Nornickel.
Although, market participants familiar with the situation doubt that Nornickel would purchase the asset. According to Kommersant sources, about a fourth of the stock owned by Shefler had been purchased by means of “legally doubtful” transactions. Kommersant sources at City also said: “The fact of the mediators purchasing the shares, and their evaluation does not necessarily imply they will be purchased by Nornickel. It is more likely that Shefler is trying to maintain his influence over the project via nominal holders, in case the transaction with Nornickel fails. Nonetheless, Skurikhin told Kommersant yesterday: “For us the transaction has been finished – we are out of the project.”
Maria Molina, Mikhail Semenov, Natalya Grib
All the Article in Russian as of Apr. 14, 2005
|
