TPAO raises $1-bln loan to increase stake in Shah Deniz project
BAKU. Aug 21 (Interfax) - Turkish TPAO has raised a $1-billion loan from the Turkish Vakif and Turkiye Is Bankasi banks for financing a deal on the purchase of a 10% stake in the project to develop the Shah Deniz gas condensate field to supplement its existing 9% stake.
The loan agreement signing took place at the Turkish Energy and Natural Resources Ministry on Thursday, the Turkish publication sabah.tr said.
France's Total signed an agreement on sale of its stake in the project to develop the Shah Deniz gas field to Turkey's state-owned TPAO on May 30, 2014.
At the signing ceremony of the loan agreement, Turkish Energy Minister Taner Yildiz said TPAO, by increasing its stake in Shah Deniz to 19%, would become the second large shareholder in the project after BP.
He also said that funds that were borrowed from Vakif and Turkiye Is Bankasi were offered by the banks on a parity basis with a maturity of seven years and a three-year tax period. The remaining sum that is needed by TPAO to finance the deal, about $450 million, will be searched for among the company's own resources.
The contract on the development of the Shah Deniz field was signed in Baku in June 1996. The project participants are BP (operator, 28.8%), Statoil (15.5%), SOCAR (16.7%), Lukoil (10%) and Nico (10%).
