The Fitch international rating agency expects the final price of 92.79% of the shares of Ukrtelecom, Ukraine’s largest telecommunication company, offered for privatization to be only slightly higher than the starting price of UAH 10.5 billion.
Nikolai Lukashevich, chief director and head of the department of the rating agency for Russia and the CIS, announced the opinion of Fitch at a press conference.
He said the forecast accounts for tough conditions of the privatization tender, as the condition deprived many large players on the market of the right to bid for Ukrtelecom.
“One can say that the price of privatization depends on the number of participants. Therefore, the [final] price is hardly to differ much from the starting price,” he said.
In his opinion, the Vodafone Company may be also interested in purchasing Ukrtelecom, as the former company possesses free finance for that and capacities.
It has been reported that potential purchasers of Ukrtelecom include the Alfa Group, System Capital Management, Russian AFK System.
As Ukrainian News earlier reported, the Cabinet of Ministers of Ukraine on September 27 decided to privatize Ukrtelecom.
The Cabinet of Ministers deprives companies whose proceeds from the sale of services in Ukraine exceed 25% of the total sum of proceeds in the country of the right to bid for Ukrtelecom.
Ukrtelecom has a 78.5% share of the fixed-line telephone market in Ukraine and provides services to 9.9 million subscribers.
