Lisin-controlled company wins auction for sale of Freight One - source
MOSCOW. Oct 28 (Interfax) - A company controlled by businessman Vladimir Lisin has won the auction for the sale of 75% minus two shares in OJSC Freight One Company, a subsidiary of OJSC Russian Railways (RZD), a source close to the tender process told Interfax.
The auction took place in Moscow on Friday
The source said that the auction was made in a single bid increment. Therefore, the total transaction came to 125.5 billion rubles (starting price for the asset 125.375 billion, first bid increment - 125 million rubles and following bids - 500 billion rubles). The auction commenced at 1:00 pm Moscow time.
The PR director for Lisin's UCL Holding, Dmitry Baukov, confirmed to Interfax that one of Lisin's companies, Independent Transport Company, has won the auction.
The tender commission officially allowed the following companies to take part in the auction on Wednesday: LLC Transoil, which is controlled by Gunvor co-owner Gennady Timchenko, Lisin's LLC Independent Transport Company and LLC NTC-Vagon, as well as CJSC Neftetransservis (NTS), which is controlled by brothers Vadim and Vyacheslav Aminov. All these companies earlier submitted applications to purchase the asset with Russia's Federal Antimonopoly Service (FAS), which approved all applications.
Transoil was considered the main contender for the share packet in Freight One. An informed source told Interfax back in the spring that negotiations with Timchenko's representatives have been a top priority since 2010. Last autumn, Timchenko's representatives even carried out preliminary due diligence for Freight One, including OJSC Rusagrotrans, the source said. Financial documentation and the freight operator's expenditures were studied.
Globaltrans Group left the running for Freight One at the end of September, saying that it would not take part in the auction "because of volatility on world financial markets". A bit later it was reported that Globaltrans plans to take part in the privatization of another RZD subsidiary, OJSC TransContainer.
In addition, the vice president of Summa, Marat Shaidayev, expressed interest in Freight One. However, the company did not have enough of its own railcars for taking part in the auction and would have needed to reach agreements with other players on the market for bringing in additional railcars.
An informed source earlier told Interfax that if the auction for Freight One is held before November, RZD would not experience a deficit of funds for financing its investment program, since the parent company would receive revenue from the auction. However, if Freight One's sale was delayed, RZD may have been deprived of 140 billion rubles in investment funds and would have been forced to borrow finances.
Freight One Company is Russia's leading railway freight operator. The company owns around 200,000 railcars of various types. Freight One transported 302.8 million tonnes of freight in 2010.