Securities Commission put Ashmore out of privatization of C market – only Radulović’s "Primat C" stayed in “game”

The Securities Commission has decided not to let Investment Fund Ashmore to continue procedure for takeover of stocks of company C market. That means that only company Primer C whose director is Slobodan Radulović is able to take part in the procedure for takeover of stocks of C market. Ashmore is out of the procedure, because it was determined, after insight into the documentation, that the starting offer was given by the bidder registered in London, whereas in the extension of the takeover process, the guarantee for that offer was delivered by te bidder registered on Iceland. Fund "Ashmore investment management limited London" gave the initial offer, while the guarantees were delivered yesterday by "Ashmore global special situations fund limited the Island of guernsey", the Commission claims.

According to unofficial information, the mistake was made when the Ashmore’s offer was registered. Namely, on the occasion of the submittal of the initial offer, company Ashmore was registered as the bidder, but the Commission made a mistake because it did not note that Ashmore is the bidder in the name of four investment funds, which are the actual bidders. Thus, Ashmore is only the agent concerning the fact that it is not in charge of the funds. Before the delivery of new offer, the Commission said to Ashmore that it could not have four bidders, but only one, so that Ashmore decided that the bidder should be one of the four investment funds that took part in the initial offer. However, the Commission estimated that there was new bidder instead of Ashmore and disqualified the offer of that investment fund.

Let us remind, the Securities Commission agreed on continuation of procedure for takeover of stocks of C market on October 26. The initial offer for takeover of stocks of C market in August 2004 was given by Slovenian Mercator, followed by investment fund Ashmore and Primer C whose director is Slobodan Radulović, present director of C market. The procedure for takeover of stocks of that company was cancelled on temporary basis by the decision made by the TRade court in Belgrade, which placed temporary ban on trade in stocks of C market, because the assignment of identification numbers to the ownership documents was challenged. Due to announced sale of stockholding shares in C market to company Delta M outside the financial market, Mercator withdrawn its offer in August 2005. The obligation of Primer C is to announce its final offer tomorrow and it will be opened on November 28. The stockholders C market has the deadline until December 6 to decide whether to sell the stocks.