Translated material
Transneft is back on the stock exchange
All ordinary shares of Transneft (4.664 million shares, or 75% of the authorized capital) are listed on the state balance sheet, while preferred shares (1.554 million shares) belong to private owners, whose names the company does not disclose. It is only known that until mid-2003, almost all of the company's preferred shares were owned by Interros, but in September 2003, the holding's leaders announced their sale to certain portfolio investors. So far, only Impexbank has officially announced investments in Transneft, which in a report according to international standards for 2004 indicated that it owns Transneft's preferred shares worth $4 million. In May 2005, the shareholders of Abakanvagonmash, part of the " Basic Element,” approved transactions with a 6.6 percent stake in Transneft preferred shares. According to Reuters, in 2006, shares of the state-owned company were listed on the balance sheets of various foreign funds and banks, including Merrill Lynch, ABN Amro, UBS, HSBC, etc.
On May 4, 2006, by decision of the Basmanny Court of Moscow, all preferred shares of the state pipeline monopoly, which were considered one of the most reliable on the market, were arrested. The arrest was requested by the Prosecutor General's Office in connection with the investigation of a criminal case against the former management of Transneft, initiated back in 1998. According to the investigation, former company president Viktor Chernyaev, vice-president Sergei Zemlyansky and 16 other heads of regional divisions of Transneft, “abusing their official position,” embezzled 1.3 million shares worth about $65 million. Minority shareholders of the company challenged the May decision Basmanny Court, and in early August the arrest of the shares was lifted. Many experts associated the actions of the security forces with pressure on Transneft management, which did not want to change the route of the oil pipeline from Eastern Siberia to the Pacific coast. But as soon as Vladimir Putin and the president of the company, Semyon Vainshtok, agreed to change the route so that it would pass almost past the fields of Rosneft and Surgutneftegaz (the companies in this case would not have to build field pipelines to the main system), a positive decision followed on the “prefs” "Transneft".
The Prosecutor General's Office, however, filed a cassation appeal against the decision to lift the arrest, but on September 13 it was rejected. However, the exchanges were in no hurry to open trading, waiting for official letters confirming the court's decision, which gave rise to some wave of skepticism regarding the fate of the monopoly's securities. Last Thursday, the head of the Federal Financial Markets Service Oleg Vyugin even suggested that in order to start trading, “the intervention of persons with greater weight in government power is necessary.”
Whether this intervention followed or not is unknown, but trading began on Friday. The fall in the quotations of Transneft's preferred shares was predicted long ago by most analysts and market participants. Indeed, during the absence of these securities, the Russian stock market fell by more than 10%, while shares of leading oil companies, including such as LUKOIL or Surgutneftegaz, fell by an average of 17-20%. Against this background, a slight decrease in Transneft quotes looks almost like an increase.
In addition to the start of trading, the end of the week was marked by another joyful event for Transneft. The Federal Tariff Service approved a decision to increase the tariff for pumping raw materials through the pipeline system by an average of 2% from October 1 this year. According to the FTS decision, the tariff rate for the services of the pipeline monopoly will be 8.9691 rubles. per 100 ton-kilometers. As Transneft explains, an increase in oil pumping tariffs occurs automatically after the company attracts loans to compensate for the costs of servicing them. This year the monopoly attracted 65 billion rubles. from Sberbank of Russia for six years in order to finance the first stage of construction of the Eastern Siberia - Pacific Ocean oil pipeline.