Freight One privatization auction to be announced Tues - Yakunin
CHEREPOVETS. Sept 5 (Interfax) - An auction for the privatization of stock in OJSC Russian Railways (RZD) hauling subsidiary Freight One will be announced on Tuesday, RZD President Vladimir Yakunin told reporters on Monday.
The board of directors, Yakunin said, has approved a final appraisal of Freight One that is 10% higher than the previous one.
Despite a relatively low market, interest in railway transport is high and RZD is anticipating a successful sale, Yakunin said.
An Interfax source in RZD top management had said not long ago that KPMG, during the run-up to the auction, had appraised the Freight One stake to be sold at roughly 125 billion rubles ($4.3 billion, or 8% more than in April, though Yakunin had predicted earlier that it would be 20% more).
As reported, the collection of bids for the 75% minus two shares in Freight One ends October 14. The results of the auction will be announced by October 28. TransCreditBank is the auction organizer. The bidding interval is 500 million rubles.
Four contenders for the Freight One stake have announced, and their various structures have filed their applications to and received permission from Russia's Federal Antimonopoly Service (FAS). They are Independent Transport Company LLC, a Vladimir Lisin asset, OJSC New Forwarding Company (NPK) and Sevtekhnotrans (STT) (both part of Globaltrans), CJSC Neftetransservis (NTS), its subsidiary CJSC NefteTransService and its subsidiary Industrial Transportation Company Skovorodino LLC, and Transoil LLC (which belongs to the oil trader Gunvor's co-owner Gennady Timchenko).
The group Summa Capital has also expressed interest in Freight One. Summa Capital does not posses the necessary number of railcars, and would have to strike a deal with other market players in order to take part in the Freight One auction.
Freight One is Russia's biggest railway freight company, with around 200,000 railcars of various configurations with which it hauled 302.3 million tonnes of cargo last year.
