Inter RAO might buy own shares from FGC as well as RusHydro - paper
MOSCOW. May 17 (Interfax) - Federal Grid Company UES (FGC) is prepared to sell its 18.72% stake in Inter RAO to the generating company, national daily Kommersant reported on Thursday, citing sources.
FGC initiated these negotiations, the paper said. The deal might be priced at a discount to the market price of the stake - 76.6 billion rubles - and be carried out in two stages. The deal could be closed by the end of June or in early July.
Government officials refrained from commenting on the reported deal, the paper said. FGC said a government decision is needed for a deal to be made, "but the company is not aware of such."
It was reported earlier that Inter RAO might buy 4.92% of its own shares from RusHydro by the end of May. The price of this stake with an 8.8% discount to the market value could amount to 17.172 billion rubles, the paper said.
Therefore, taking into account the deal in the works to buy out its shares from RusHydro, Inter RAO could consolidate 23.5% of its own shares at a cost of up to 100 billion rubles.
State holding company Rosneftegaz holds a 27.63% stake in Inter RAO, the power company's subsidiary Inter RAO Capital holds 18.4% of shares in its parent company, and the free float is 30.52%.
The paper reported that Inter RAO Capital would not increase its stake in Inter RAO by the whole amount of shares held by RusHydro and FGC. It might acquire only part of these shares, and the rest might be bought by an outside company that would later become part of the Inter RAO Group, one of the paper's sources said.
Commenting on these reports in a conference call with analysts on Wednesday, Inter RAO management board member Ilnar Mirsiyapov said that Inter RAO periodically holds negotiations on potential deals.
"Periodically we are approached not even by RusHydro, but a number of other shareholders or investors who want to either sell or buy a fairly large stake [in Inter RAO]. In this case, since we stated that we're not selling the treasury stake [as] it might be used to bring a strategic investor into capital, we're saying that there are other shareholders with whom this conversation, perhaps, will be a little more productive and lead to a result," Mirsiyapov said.