Gazprombank mulling possibility of participation in Moscow-St.Petersburg HSR project

MOSCOW. Nov 15 (Interfax) - Gazprombank (GPB) is studying the possibility of participating in the project to build a high-speed railway (HSR) between Moscow and St. Petersburg, Gazprombank First Vice President Alexei Chichkanov told reporters on the sidelines of Transport Week-2023.

"We are mulling participation in this project. It is still early to talk about specific figures," he said in response to a question.

Chichkanov explained that it is premature to talk about GPB's role until the structure of the project and the payment mechanism - whether it will be exclusively credit or equity - are determined.

He said that currently the government and the established working group are in talks with the initiators on its structure "in terms of who is responsible for what, where the federal part of responsibility lies, where is the regional part lies, and what is the responsibility of Russian Railways and business".

"So depending on what structure is approved, we will consider our role. But we will definitely participate in it," he said.

"We are considering both shareholder participation and participation in senior debt," Chichkanov also said.