Russia has changed oil players in Slovakia

Oil Company RussNeft has struck a deal on the purchase of 49 percent stake of Yukos at Slovakian Pipeline Company Transpetrol. The cost of the acquisition approximated $105 million. “The deal was finalized during this weekend. The purchase and sale documents were signed in Moscow,” Interfax was informed by a source close to the deal. While talking earlier about the reasons of his interest in the stake at Transpetrol head of RussNeft Mikhail Gutseriev pointed out that RussNeft delivered its own crude oil to this region. “To deliver crude oil it is interesting for us to have this pipe,” said he.
Experts agree that the acquisition will allow the company to strengthen its position at the Eastern European market. The buyer of the Russian crude oil in Slovakia is company Slovnaft, a subsidiary of Hungarian MOL. RussNeft has repeatedly expressed its interest in cooperating with the latter, and by coming into possession of Yukos’ stake at Transpetrol RussNeft has advanced towards entering a long-term agreement with MOL.
The goals of the company are much more far-reaching though. As is well known in the near future RussNeft is going to conduct IPO at the international market and in this connection the present acquisition of foreign assets is absolutely to the point.
It should be mentioned that Transpetrol acts as an operator of the Slovakian section of Druzhba pipeline connecting Russia and Europe and being of strategic value to the country’s petroleum market. Basing on this fact experts point out that the deal on the acquisition of Yukos’ stake at the Slovakian company carried not only economic but in many respects political meaning. It was by no chance that last December German Greff, head of the Economic Development Ministry, sent a letter to Slovakia supporting RussNeft in the contest in which Yukos tendered its stake at Transpetrol. The analysts are sure that the deal related to the most important section of the crude oil transportation facility could not be made without being backed up by Russian authorities. As FIM Securities analyst Dmitry Tsaregorodtsev said to the NG, the outcome of the deal showed alignment of forces inland. “It is clear that Yukos could not remain the holder of this asset. First of all, it needs money more than shares at this company. Secondly, Yukos is politically unreliable”.  For the government it must be much safer to have a loyal company as the owner of the important part of the oil pipeline,” concluded the analyst.