Seimar Alliance Thought Better
Kazakhstan’s Seimar Alliance announced Saturday it shelved the purchase of Russia’s Bank Petrocommerce and attributed the decision to poor market opportunities. The actual reason, however, could be emergence of the second bidder – Italian UniCredit.
”We have shelved the deal to acquire Petrocommerce till stabilization on global markets,” Seimar Alliance Board Chairman Saken Seifullin told Interfax-Kazakhstan. It was impossible to get any comments in Bank Petrocommerce Sunday. In the press service of IFD Kapital, they declined to comment either. The end beneficiaries of Petrocommerce, LUKOIL President Vagit Alekperov and Vice President Leonid Fedun, own the bank exactly through IFD Kapital.
Seimar Alliance Financial Corp. controls 69.61 percent of voting stocks of Alliance Bank, which leads on consumer credit market of Kazakhstan. The bank’s capitalization reached $4 billion after the IPO that it recently held on LSE. Russia’s Federal Antimonopoly Service sanctioned the holding to buy 51 percent in Petrocommerce in July; afterwards, Seimar Alliance was going to extend to 100 percent, paying $1.5 billion to $1.6 billion overall.
The analysts say Seimar Alliance wanted to pay by borrowed money for Petrocommerce. But it would be very unprofitable to raise loans oversees in view of today’s bank crisis there. So, the actions of Kazakh party appear quite justified, the analysts speculate.
Meanwhile, another bidder has apparently emerged for Petrocommerce. According to two sources, both of them the anonymous ones, Italian UniCredit offered even more than Seimar Alliance. But the Italians that own International Moscow Bank and Aton Co. here have declined to confirm the information, saying they don’t comment on market rumors.
www.kommersant.com
All the Article in Russian as of Aug. 27, 2007
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