Moscow — Russia’s Trust Bank said on Friday it had sold an oilfield service company to Gazprombank-owned entities, offloading the asset earlier than planned due to stagnation in the industry and amid declining exploration investment.
Trust Bank is an umbrella for non-performing loans of Otkritie, Promsvyazbank and B&N banks, rescued by the central bank in 2017. It is aiming to recover funds and will be wound up once its balance sheet is fully cleaned up.
Trust Bank said it had sold Geotek Seismic Exploration, but declined to disclose details on the price. It sold property firm Inteko for $600 million this week.
“The asset was planned to be sold in 2026, but we could not wait – we could not guess what might happen with the market by that date,” the Vedomosti daily, which first reported the news, quoted Trust Bank President Alexander Sokolov as saying.
“Fortunately, we managed to find a high-quality investor with enough financial and industry resources to both retain and develop the company.”
Reporting by Elena Fabrichnaya; Writing by Alexander Marrow; Editing by Mark Trevelyan – Reuters
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