Sibneft Says Suspends Merger with YUKOS

[emad]

MOSCOW (Reuters) - Russia's oil firm Sibneft (SIBN.RTS: Quote, Profile, Research) said on Friday it was temporarily suspending its merger with embattled oil major YUKOS (YUKO.RTS: Quote, Profile, Research) .

The announcement, shortly after the start of a joint shareholders' meeting to elect board members to the newly-merged company, stunned financial markets and sent YUKOS shares crashing by more than six percent.

"The completion of a merger between YUKOS and Sibneft is suspended due to a mutual agreement reached between the core shareholders of both companies," Sibneft said in a statement.

It was the latest dramatic twist in a drama set off by the arrest last month of YUKOS's then chief executive Mikhail Khodorkovsky on charges of tax evasion and fraud.

http://reuters.com/financeNewsArticle.jhtml;jsessionid=JO4FN2FZ43J0SCRBAELCFFA?type=businessNews&storyID=3905623

Bad luck for Roman Abramovich who has been on a wildcat spending spree for the last three months, buying up UK football club Chelsea, overpriced yachts on the Med and European prime real estate. Let's just hope his bank manager views his SIBNEFT holdings as sufficient collateral.....


Edit: from BBC News:

Russian oil firm Sibneft has said it is temporarily suspending a merger with embattled rival Yukos. The news, which came on the day the merger was due to be completed, caused an instant 7% plunge in Yukos's share price. It is the latest blow for the firm, whose main shareholder, Mikhail Khodorkovsky, is in prison on charges of fraud and tax evasion. It is still unclear whether the two firms intend the merger to go ahead. A Yukos spokesman insisted that the Sibneft statement was not a joint announcement, but refused to elaborate. Given the level of speculation surrounding the fate of Yukos, many analysts are likely to suspect the influence of politics behind the scenes. Many observers will assume that the Kremlin has scuppered the merger in order to punish Yukos; others may simply reason that Sibneft did not want to become associated with such a risky partner.
Sibneft is part-owned by football-loving tycoon Roman Abramovich, who has been progressively selling his Russian assets this year.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/3245884.stm

[jmcgowanjm]

1. Arrest warren buffett and split XOM/Putin:TeddyRoosevelt of Russia

The workers/consumers will even sacrifice
the lives of their own flesh and blood if it means
keeping the rich fat and happy because the
rich have promised them that some day
they can join them at the table!

Listen,friends, you have to face the truth:you
are never going to be rich. You have a one
in a million chance.

It's worse than that. You are not going to have
Medicare, Social Security, no vacations.

You are expendable, you have no rights, and, BTW,
"what's a union?

Dude, Where's My Country
Michael Moore

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