The Russian Federation took control of Russian “daughters” from two Western energy giants
[ad_1]
Russia took control of Finland’s Fortum Oyj and Germany’s Uniper SE over their companies in the country, the first such move by the Kremlin.
It is reported Bloomberg with reference to the decree of the President of the Russian Federation Vladimir Putin.
The decree allows the government to introduce “temporary” state control over the assets of companies or individuals from “unfriendly” states, that is, the USA and other countries that have imposed sanctions against the Russian Federation.
The Federal Property Management Agency, which will manage the expropriated assets, said ownership of the assets would not be affected.
The only assets currently listed in the application are 83.7% of Uniper’s shares in Unipro PJSC and 98.2% of Fortum’s shares in the local Fortum PJSC. Both companies tried to sell their shares after the full-scale Russian invasion of Ukraine, but were blocked by the Russian government.
Fortum shares fell 3% in the first minutes of trading at 10:02 am in Helsinki.
Russia threatened to expropriate the assets of foreign companies last year – after Germany took control of the “daughter” of Gazprom, which it later nationalized. Chancellor Olaf Scholz’s government has also seized oil refining assets that are partly owned by the sanctioned Rosneft.
The decree introduces temporary external management on an individual basis, and the list of assets can be expanded if necessary. Returning control to the companies is possible only by decree of the President of the Russian Federation.
Fortum said it had no official confirmation of the Russian move or its possible implications for the assets and would comment when it had more information. Fortum is one of the largest foreign investors in the Russian electricity industry, which owns seven TPPs in the Urals and Western Siberia, as well as the country’s largest portfolio of wind and solar power plants. In May 2022, the company announced its intention to put the assets up for sale.
Earlier, Uniper recorded a loss of 4.4 billion euros from its Russian division and declared that it no longer controls the activities of its “daughter”. The company also tried to sell its “daughter” and in February announced that it had found a Russian buyer, but the deal stalled.
[ad_2]
Original Source Link
