Yukos may file for bankruptcy

OAO Yukos Oil Co., Russia's biggest oil exporter may file for bankruptcy unless the management board contrives to obtain extra funds to help settle a $3.4 billion tax bill.

(PRWEB) July 24, 2004 -- OAO Yukos Oil Co., Russia's biggest oil exporter may file for bankruptcy unless the management board contrives to obtain extra funds to help settle a $3.4 billion tax bill. If not - Yukos may run out of money by mid-August, as it was announced at a Moscow press conference yesterday. To date Yukos has $900 million a month in revenue frozen. The management board said that declaring bankruptcy would be good for company because it would protect it from creditors for a certain period and prevent impairments to their assets.

On Tuesday Russian officials declared that they will seize and sell OAO Yuganskneftegaz (which accounts for 60 per cent of Yukos's oil output and is valued at $20 billion by Goldman Sachs Group Inc). The statement have raised concern in world oil markets and caused investors to pull cash from Russia. The fact that Yuganskneftegaz would be put on the market immediately perplexed Yukos management as its assets are estimated as $30.4 billion -- 10 times more than tax bill.

The Yukos shares fell as much as 14 percent to 146 rubles and were at 153.80 as of 12:33 p.m. in Moscow. The stock has shed about 30 percent of its value in the past three days, wiping out about $6.2 billion in market value. New York crude oil prices have risen 9.6 percent this month, partly on concern that supplies from Russia, the world's second- largest oil exporter next to Saudi Arabia, may fall because of the government's dispute with Yukos.

Yukos has filed a bankruptcy petition to Russian arbitration court; - in case it would be upheld it could delay sales of the company's assets while a list of creditors would be drafted. Until now, the company failed to meet a July 7 deadline to pay $3.4 billion in taxes from 2000, the largest tax bill in Russian history.

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