Steven Lynch, maanging director of OOO Monte Valle
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Interview with American YUKOS Assets Buyer
Steven Lynch, managing partner of OOO Monte Valle, talked to Kommersant's Denis Rebrov about his participation in the sale of YUKOS assets. Following is an excerpt from that interview.
Why did you become interested in YUKOS assets?
I'm an entrepreneur and I look for business opportunities… I looked at the contents of the lot and decided that it could make a profit from that project, so I agreed to it. We began to study the list of documents necessary to participate in the auction. Do we have a balance sheet? Yes. Do we have a charter? Yes. And so on. Do we have the prepayment? We have investors. Our theory was that the YUKOS auction was a lot more open that people thought. We bid and won, so our theory was right.
Have you been working in Russia for long?
In real estate, since 1999. Before that, from 1996 to 1998, I studies at the Wharton School of Business, University of Pennsylvania. In 1998, started working at CreditSuisseFirstBoston making investments in real estate in Russia, the CIS and the Baltic. I've lived in Russia since 1992, except for those years when I was in business school and 2004-2006, when I lived in Kazakhstan. In 1992-1994, I worked as a consultant to the Peace Corps in Nizhny Novgorod, then in private business.
Did you consult with the Russian authorities before participating in the YUKOS auctions? Did you go to the Kremlin, ministries, Rosneft?
I didn't go anywhere at all.
What do you plan to do with the YUKOS energy assets?
I've already sold them to investors.
All of them?
Almost.
Who is the new owner of the energy assets? You said that part of the assets may be acquired by chairman of the RAO UES of Russia strategy and reform committee David Herne. Did he do so?
He can speak for himself. I can only say that none of the investors are Russian. They are foreigners, and I don't mean investors from Cyprus, but real foreigners, four different nationalities, one American. [Kommersant has learned that structures associated with Herne bought part of the assets, and the remainder were bought by small investment funds.]
Did you intends to resell those assets from the beginning?
Yes.
Did you buy them with your own money?
No.
How much did you sell them for?
The tax service knows.
www.kommersant.com
All the Article in Russian as of Aug. 21, 2007
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