The privatisation agency launched yesterday a sale procedure for the sea shipping company Navibulgare following the line strategy approved by the parliament in mid-March. Companies and consortiums interested in acquiring 70% of Navibulgare will be able to purchase tender documents by Aug 20 and to submit participation requests by Sep 10. The privatisation agency will review candidates’ compliance with the requirements set in the privatisation strategy and will announce qualified bidders by Sep 28. Certified candidates will have to submit preliminary acquisition bids by Oct 18. The final procedure for submission of binding bids will be launched towards the end of the year. The privatisation agency hopes to complete the sale procedure by the middle of next year in case of sufficient investor interest.

As specified in the strategy for privatisation of Navibulgare, the state will sell out a 70% stake to a strategic investor defined as a legal entity with rented shipping volumes of at least 1.3mn tonnes of dead weight on time-charter contracts for each of the last 3 reporting or consortiums in which at least 70% of the equity capital is held by a company meeting the above mentioned requirements. The winning bidder will have an option for acquiring the remaining 30% stake at a later stage. Part of the residual shares could be floated on the stock exchange but only in case that they were not purchased by the main stakeholder. Navibulgare reports a total asset value of BGN 959mn (EUR 490mn) in the company’s consolidated report for last year. The equity capital is booked at BGN 890mn as of the end of the year. The net consolidated profit of the company dropped 55.5% y/y to BGN 18.6% on flat net sales of BGN 433mn last year. Navibulgare is managing a commercial fleet of 71 vessels at an average age of 20 years and expects 3 news ships from the local producer Bulyard Shipping Industry.

Media reports released about 3 months ago indicate that two powerful Greek shipping companies, Tsakos Group and Avin International, have expressed interest in the privatisation of Navibulgare. Firms linked to Germany’s Nordbank are also expected to take part in the tender while Bulgaria’s largest holding company Chimimport, which has subsidiaries in several transport sectors, is expected to join the race in partnership with local or foreign investors.