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shipyard’s shareholders.
Romania’s largest natural gas producer Romgaz, which controls over half the domestic market, floated a €500mn five-year bond on the Bucharest Stock Exchange (BVB) on November 19.
The bond, issued in October through a private placement, is part of Romgaz’s strategy to raise €1.5bn for its projects, including the Neptun Deep offshore gas field it is developing with OMV Petrom.
The bond carries a 4.75% coupon and was priced at a 4.77% yield. According to Romgaz CEO Razvan Popescu, the subsequent drop in trading yields to below 4.5% reflects robust investor demand.
Greek utility company PPC announced that it has entered into a binding agreement with Evryo Group, owned by funds managed by Macquarie Asset Management, to acquire its 629-MW renewable energy generation portfolio in Romania.
The portfolio includes mainly wind farms (600 MW), but also 22 MW of hydroelectric power, 6 MW of storage in batteries and 1 MW of solar capacity. The deal includes 145 MW of assets under development as well.
Hidroelectrica, Romania’s largest energy producer, reported a 22% y/y decline in electricity output to 11.35 TWh for January-September, attributing the drop to regulatory changes that introduced price volatility and adverse hydrological conditions.
Revenue similarly contracted by 25% y/y to RON7.2bn (€1.44bn), in line with a 24% y/y decline in energy sold, totalling 11.72 GWh.
Romania's Ministry of Energy announced on November 4 that it had signed an MoU with Japanese conglomerate Itochu Corporation to advance the development of the Tarnița-Lăpuștești hydropower plant — a 1-GW reversible power project envisioned since 1979 but which has repeatedly stalled over the past decades.
Water solutions
Outside the energy sector, Axel Johnson Inc. (AJI), a US-based investment firm owned by Sweden's Johnson family, announced it has acquired Romanian water solutions company La Fântâna from Oresa investment fund and founder Cristian Amza.
AJI operates Kinetico, a water delivery business similar to La Fântâna, in the United States.
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