Page 38 - UKRRptSept18

The fund also announced tenders to select privatization advisers for another group of companies, including petrochemical asset Oriana, chemical plant Sumykhimprom, financial company Ukragroleasing, machinery asset Azovmash and four small heat and power stations.
Investors will be watching the attempt to sell OPP closely which has failed twice already because of the company’s accumulated debts to oligarchs and the threat of legal action as the original sale of the plant has been disputed. The government tried to sell the plant last year, but cancelled the auction in September 2017 w ith intent of putting back on sale in the spring of 2018.
The new law on privatization stipulates that large state assets (controlling stakes in companies with over UAH0.25bn in book value of assets) should be privatized involving financial advisers. In June, the fund initiated the privatization of 22 large assets under the new law.
“It’s positive to see the fund is moving forward with its earlier announced privatization list, which it failed to do for the last four years. It’s unlikely that all 22 assets will be privatized in 2018, and it’s not likely that Ukraine’s UAH22.5bn ($830mn) privatization proceeds target will be reached this year. But there is a chance that Ukraine will be able to boost revenue from sale of state property from the previous year’s result of UAH3.4bn,” Alexander Paraschiy of Concorde Capital said in a note.
And the privatisation programme maybe widened to include defence companies . T he Ukrainian authorities are preparing a bill to lift restrictions on the privatisation of state defence enterprises, according to the National Security and Defence Council of Ukraine (NSDC) Secretary Oleksandr Turchynov.
However , privatisation is not popular with the general public . a poll earlier this year found that 47% of respondents oppose possible p rivatisation of state-owned enterprises.
In 2017, the Ukrainian authorities obtained UAH3.244bn ($123mn) from the privatisation of state-owned assets. Kyiv restarted its privatisation drive in August, when the SPF sold blocking stakes in several power companies to System Capital Management (SCM) Group controlled by Ukraine's richest oligarch Rinat Akhmetov. At the same time, the government in Kyiv intended earlier to meet its planned UAH17.1bn of privatisation revenues by the end of 2017.
In 2016 , Kyiv obtained only UAH188.92mn ($7mn) from the privatisation of state-owned assets, or 1.1% of the UAH17.1bn ($627.5mn) plan set in the 2016 budget.
38 UKRAINE Country Report September 2018 www.intellinews.com