Gazprom "prospecting" Oltchim through Oil Gas Trade LLC

Russian giant Gazprom could be behind Oil Gas Trade LLC, who recently visited Oltchim, said sources with business connections in the Russian Federation.

Oil Gas Trade LLC is a private company from Russia, with a small turnover, but it is also acting on the order of the big customers, such as Gazprom or Gazprom Export, as a lobby structure, consultant or bidding proxy, our sources also say.

Officially, out of the few available on the internet, Oil Gas Trade LLC Russia is a producer and distributor of oil and petrochemical products, with two small production lines. The annual volume of sales is about 50-100 million dollars. Oil Gas Trade LLC is also presented on the internet as a reliable trader, a partner of the major Russian refineries.

Our sources also say that Oil Gas Trade LLC is now conducting an evaluation of Oltchim, and they are ready to finance the company, but this only applies to the platform of Râmnicu Vâlcea, not to the Arpechim petrochemical division and the eponymous refinery, which is owned by Petrom.

The general manager of Oltchim, Mihail Tălpăşanu recently said that Oil Gas Trade LLC Russia has visited the plant and has addressed hundreds of questions to its receivers. Mr. Tălpăşanu also said that Oltchim was visited by the owner of the Russian company - Vadin Jelenzikov - who was accompanied by the representatives of the bank willing to finance their takeover and emphasized that the Russians even sent the letters of good standing to the receivers.

According to the quoted sources, major Russian companies don't want to come in for direct call for tenders after the "misadventures" of Russian company TISE, which saw its name used repeatedly by the Romanian authorities in relation to Oltchim, but which saw lots of obstacles raised before them by the privatization of the plant. Eventually, TISE has allegedly abandoned the idea of having any official meeting in Bucharest or Moscow, with the representatives of the Government, our sources say.

The Government claims that interested in the acquisition of Oltchim are companies such as Socar, KazMunayGaz, PCC (significant minority shareholder of the plant, which owns, directly and indirectly, about 33% of the shares). Businessman Ştefan Vuza, who controls the SCR group, wants to join forces with Ioan Niculae, the owner of Interagro, to take over Oltchim. Unofficially, the list of interested investors includes Israeli investor fund "Fortissimo Capital", as well as the Chinese which own Borsodchem Ungaria (a competitor of Oltchim).