MOSCOW, Aug 10 (PRIME) — Minority individual shareholders of Russian oil company TNK-BP Holding have estimated the damage from the companys failure to take part in Russian oil major Rosnefts Arctic project at 87.112 billion rubles, according to a statement of the shareholders lawyer seen by PRIME Wednesday.
Minority shareholders, including Andrei Prokhorov, filed two claims with the Tyumen Regions Arbitration Court seeking to levy the damage. The first claim was filed against Peter Charow and Richard Sloan, members of TNK-BP Holdings board of directors, who are claimed to be responsible for the loss. The second claim is against BP Russian Investments Limited and its parent company BP Plc, which are claimed to be responsible for blocking a possible strategic partnership with Rosneft.
The minority shareholders believe that TNK-BP Holding could acquire 1,010,158,003 common shares in Rosneft, if the company participates in the project. The estimated damage represents the difference between the current value of those shares and the value at which TNK-BP Holding could acquire them.
The court is expected to hear the claim against BP Russian Investments Limited and BP Plc on September 21, with a hearing for the claim against Charow and Sloan set for October 12.
Earlier this year, Rosneft and U.K.-based oil company BP failed to complete a U.S. $7.8 billion deal concluded in January, under which Rosneft planned to swap 9.5% of its shares for 5.0% in BP, while also agreeing to jointly develop Arctic oil and gas fields, due to a number of corporate disagreements with Russias Alfa-Access-Renova (AAR) consortium on the participation of TNK-BP in the deal. TNK-BP is held by BP and AAR on a parity basis.
(29.4166 rubles U.S. $1)
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