Locomotives will go cheaply

The Board of Directors of RZhD OJSC approved the sale of 25% of the shares of Transmashholding (TMH), the largest manufacturer of locomotives and passenger railway cars in Russia and the CIS. However, the monopoly, which suffers from insufficient investment funds, does rather strange presales preparation of the asset. RZhD OJSC delays placing orders at the TMH plants, making the holding stop production and downsize employees. As a result, the value of the RZhD OJSC stock is falling, and does not currently exceed 13 billion roubles. The other shareholders of the holding are prepared to study the possibility to buy the securities.

Vladimir Yakunin, President of RZhD OJSC, declared yesterday that the Board of Directors of the company had decided to sell 25% of the shares of TMH on February 2^nd. According to the top manager, shareholders of the Dutch company The Breakers Investments B.V., which owns 100% of TMH, confirmed their readiness to buy the stock. V.Yakunin said that the stock had not yet been evaluated, but he believes that the monopoly may receive approximately 13 billion roubles. It is planned to close the deal by the end of the year. RZhD OJSC refused to comment, but a source of Kommersant, who is aware of the situation, said that “the offer has not yet been made; only the interest in the asset was declared as an answer to the monopoly’s query”.

Beside RZhD, the French firm Alstom owns 25% of the shares of TMH via The Breakers, Transgroup, a structure of Iskandar Makhmudov and Andrey Bokarev, owns another 50% minus two shares. Representatives of the businessmen and of Transgroup did not reply to the Kommersant’s query. Alstom confirmed that it would “consider the buy-out of the shares”. Evgeny Zhilin, Managing Partner of the Law Firm "YUST", points out that The Breakers itself may become the initial buyer, distributing the shares between the remaining shareholders afterwards.

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