RDIF expects to close acquisition of EDC stake before year-end - Dmitriev
VLADIVOSTOK. Sept 5 (Interfax) - Russian Direct Investment Fund (RDIF) expects to close a deal on joint acquisition with foreign partners of a stake in Russian oilfield services group Eurasia Drilling Company (EDC) before the end of 2017.
"We expect that the deal will be closed this year," RDIF chief Kirill Dmitriev said in an interview with Interfax.
He declined to specify the size of the stake the consortium plans to acquire, saying only that it is "a significant minority stake."
RDIF has already filed to acquire the stake with the Federal Antimonopoly Service (FAS). The other members of the consortium are the Russia-China Investment Fund and the UAE's Mubadala Development Company.
Simultaneously, U.S. Schlumberger has begun the process of filing with the FAS to acquire a 51% stake in EDC. However, the FAS and Natural Resources and Environment Ministry, noting that EDC operates at strategic Russian fields, have said the U.S. company would have to provide guarantees that EDC would not suffer from sanctions. The Natural Resources Ministry has proposed that Schlumberger be obliged to sell its stake to a strategic investor if sanctions are strengthened, and to uphold all current EDC contracts. The Russian authorities set analogous conditions in 2015, during a previous bid by Schlumberger to acquire EDC. At that time, Schlumberger decided to drop the deal.
"We have viewed and continue to view the deal independently of the Schlumberger deal. A long time ago, independently of Schlumberger, we proposed taking a minority stake in the company, in order to provide services on the market in Saudi Arabia, the UAE and other Middle Eastern countries, among other things. Our deal was not and is not tied in any way to the Schlumberger deal," Dmitriev said.