RE: More Grist to the Mill24 Apr 2022 22:50
Part III
Strukov's company acquired a stake in Petropavlovsk in February 2020 from Roman Trotsenko, supplementing it with shares in free float. And already in June 2020, a corporate conflict broke out in the company. Yuzhuralzoloto, along with other shareholders - Slevin and Everest funds.
Even then, The Moscow Post suggested that Petropavlovsk could be subject to an ordinary raider seizure.
As a result, the founder of Petropavlovsk, ex-senator from the Amur Region Pavel Maslovsky left the post of general director of the company and the board of directors of the structure. According to him, the results of the shareholder meeting were "directed" in advance. RBC wrote about this.
Now Maslovsky is under investigation - he is suspected of involvement in a possible fraud - the theft of funds of Pokrovsky Rudnik JSC. Until now, there are rumors that the criminal case may be fake - at least it hypothetically could be beneficial to Strukov in order to rein in former company leaders who have great influence on the team.
Meanwhile, it seems that Petropavlovsk did not go to Strukov for future use. As a result, in early March of this year, Sergey Sudarikov's Region group of companies bought out a 29.18% stake in Petropavlovsk. It was not specified which specific share was discussed, but it is known that Strukov's share was just that. Earlier, Kommersant reported that it had information about Strukov's desire to sell his stake.
In turn, the intentions of the Region regarding Petropavlovsk, or rather, how long the Region may need Petropavlovsk shares, are not yet fully clear.
On the one hand, against the background of a difficult geopolitical situation, gold prices are now rising, while Petropavlovsk shares have fallen sharply in price over the past two years, so it cannot be ruled out that Region could consider this transaction as a long-term investment. On the other hand, interference in the UMMC process will surely require Sudarikov to respond.
Mining to the point
The Moscow Post previously expressed the version that, perhaps, Strukov was not originally going to return debts to Gazprom and intended to "reset" the company after he could earn extra money on it. And the sale of the package to "Region" fits well with this version.
However, Sudarikov's benefit is incomprehensible in this case - why would he buy a company on which such obligations are? However, given his proximity to Igor Sechin and other influential people, Sudarikov himself may not have been asked.
Recall, as Vedomosti reported, Sergei Sudarikov is the head in 5 organizations, including the Rossium concern and MKB capital, owned by the owner of the Moscow Credit Bank (MKB) Roman Avdeev. At the same time, MKB is called almost the base bank for Rosneft structures.