Ukraine’s steel industry is being carved up between local business
groups, with foreign traders and north-American-based exiles grabbing
a little piece of the action. But don’t worry: it’s all a step towards
the market.
There are still only two Ukrainian steel companies – the Ilyich plant
at Mariupol and the Nizhnedneprovsky pipe works – whose shares trade
in noticeable quantities. And transparency is primitive: no-one has
ever seen a set of accounts for most of the big plants. But, whereas a
year ago industry observers simply couldn’t tell who owned what, this
year’s battles for control have brought out contours of ownership more
clearly.
This month’s spat is over Severny iron ore mine, a key raw material
supplier to the eastern Ukrainian steel belt. A 36% stake was sold at
auction on 13 September to the Ukraine Metallurgical Company (UMC),
part of the Ukrsibbank financial-industrial group (FIG), which also
manages the state’s majority holding in Severny. But other bidders
launched a legal challenge, because all except UMC and Ukrsibbank were
disqualified by a condition that they had to strike a deal with
Severny’s largest creditors … first of which is Ukrsibbank.
The justice ministry has held up the sale while the legal challenges –
which has been accompanied by accusations that friends in the right
places, rather than fair competition, determined the auction’s outcome
– are heard.
Apart from bargain-basement purchases of state assets, bankruptcy is a
commonly-used means of acquiring assets. A FIG (or FIGs?) based in
Ukraine’s steel-making capital, Donetsk, has been accused of
aggravating conditions at another ore mine, Komsomolskoe, with a
possible view to taking control of it.
The Ilyich works at Mariupol, which stands outside the FIGs and is
controlled by a holding company owned jointly by 38,000 employees, has
a five-year management contract for state-owned Komsomolskoe. Last
month Ilyich’s management publicly accused Danko, a Donetsk-based
holding company, of buying up Komsomolskoe’s debts with malicious
intent – either to take control of the mine or paralyse it.
Komsomolskoe owes Danko 20 million hryvny.
Danko is part of a group of companies in Donetsk, including the
Industrial Union of Donbass (IUD) and Kontsern Energo, which between
them control four of Ukraine’s eight largest steel makers (Azovstal,
Alchevsk, Yenakievsky and the Donetsk metal works), two of the five
largest steel pipe plants (Khartsyzsk and Dnepropetrovsk), and an
array of coal mines and coking works.
Danko, IUD and Kontsern Energo deny ownership links, but work closely
together and comprise a formidable political force. Their ownership
remains unclear: entrepreneur Rinat Akhmetov, reputed to head the IUD,
says that he works with the company but owns no part of it.
The Khartsyzk and Donetsk FIGs are not the only ones who see value in
controlling raw materials supplies. Privat Bank group, a
Dnepropetrovsk-based FIG, in July bought out the Metallurgia group
headed by Konstantin Grigorishin, which had been its main competitor
in the production of ferro-alloys, important additives for some steel
products. The fact that Privat had already taken control of some
important magnesium ore mines, which are one step further up the
production chain, helped Grigorishin decide to sell up.
Upstream assets might be levers to gaining control of steel plants,
but it’s the downstream players that will survive and grow. Thus
Grigorishin is now concentrating on developing the Dnepropetrovsk
special steels plant he controls. Aleksandr Pecheritsyn, head of
research at Alfa Bank in Kyiv, says: “To compete with Asian producers,
the owners of Ukrainian steel works will have to modernise plant and,
above all, increase their capacity to produce value-added products
instead of exporting crude steel.”
This point hasn’t been lost on Viktor Pinchuk, the politician, media
magnate and son-in-law of president Leonid Kuchma, who heads
Interpipe, a Donetsk-based FIG that owns three pipe producers:
Nizhnedneprovsky (Ukraine’s largest), Nikopol stainless pipe works,
and Novomoskovsky.
Interpipe has increased sales in central Asia and the Middle East this
year. Its only serious rival in pipe production is the IUD, which is
targeting the Russian market with large-diameter pipes made at
Khartsyzk. IUD vice president Aleksandr Pilipienko says that upgrading
Khartsyzk is “our first priority”, and that $80 million will be
invested there in the mid term.
Pilipienko believes that the steel industry is “as transparent as it
needs to be”, since no foreign equity investment is in prospect. But
strategic foreign players now have a significant presence. The pioneer
was steel trader Mohammed Zahoor, whose Istil group now runs a
mini-mill in Donetsk that last year received a $25 million EBRD loan,
the bank’s first to the sector.
North-American-based Ukrainians are moving in too. Midland Resources,
a metals trader headed by the Canadian-Ukrainian Alex Schneider,
indirectly controls the Zaporozhye works, Ukraine’s fourth-largest
steel maker. Texas-based Michael Bleyzer’s venture capital group has
snapped up a small pipe plant at Makeevka.
Ultimately the pressure for greater transparency and corporate
governance standards will be driven by the need for investment in
mostly aging capital assets. The commercial banks will be the first to
demand higher standards, says Christopher Bachofen, who buys Ukrainian
steel for Stemcor, a major European trader. “A year ago, the idea of
trade finance deals for many Ukrainian producers would have been
laughed at. Now several banks are considering them seriously. This
time next year, this could be an active market.”
Dutch and Austrian banks have tested the water. ING has worked with
Ilyich, Fortis with Zaporozhye and Raiffeisen with Kontsern Energo’s
Donetsk metal works. Bachofen says: “It’s only going to be short-term
export-related deals to start with. Before there is any money for
investment, there will have to be a sea change on transparency and
corporate governance.”
But it’s a question of when, rather than whether. Schneider of
Midland Resources says: “In the long run, all the owners have
everything to gain by transparency. It’s an essential step towards
accessing finance and developing the industry.”
Ownership in Ukraine’s steel industry
Production of steel in tonnes
STEEL WORKS
Linked to the Industrial Union of Donbass and its partners
Azovstal – 25% owned directly by IUD
(2002 proj’d) 4.4 m t
Alchevsk – 18% owned directly by IUD. (Sokrat-info news agency reports
ownership of 32.5% IUD, 32.5% Interpipe, 25% + one share Lugansk
regional administration, 10% others.)
(2001) 2.89m t
Energomashspetstal – a business partner of IUD
n/a
Kramatorskii – a business partner of IUD
(Capacity) 173,000 tpy steel, 496,500 tpy pig iron
Yenakievsky steel works – controlling stake owned by Danko
(2002 proj’d) 1.2 t
Donetsk metal works – 62% stake owned by Kontsern Energo
(2001) 840,000 t
Linked to Privat Bank group
Dnepropetrovsk (Petrovsky) metallurgical combine – de facto controlled
by Privat Bank group, according to TACIS and press reports
(Capacity) 1.23 million tpy
Zaporozhsky steel rolling mill – controlled by Privat Bank group,
according to press
n/a
Konstantinovsky – controlled by Privat Bank group, according to press
n/a
Controlled by other Ukrainian owners
Ilyich (Mariupolsky metallurgical combine) – 87% owned by Ilyichstal,
an employee-owned company headed by general director Vladimir Boiko;
6% portfolio investors; 4-5% free float
(2001) 1.3 m t
Dneprospetsstal – controlling stake owned by Metallurgia group
(2001) 50,000 t stainless steel, 260,000 t alloy steel (excluding
stainless), other alloys
Donetsk metal rolling works – controlling stake owned by trading
companies headed by Igor Andreev
(2001) 156,000 tpy
Foreign-controlled
Zaporozhstal – controlled indirectly by Midland Resources of Canada
(2002 proj’d) 3.75m t
Istil Donetsk – owned 99.9% by Istil Group of the US, 0.1% by Metals
Ukraine
(2001) 749,000 t
State-controlled
Krivorozhstal – 100% state-owned
(2001) 6m t
Makeevka works – 60.89% state-owned
Capacity 1.2m tpy
Dnepropetrovsky Komintern– 60% state-owned
n/a
Dneprovsky (Dzerzhinsky) – state controlled, state stake managed by
Ukrsibbank
(2001) 3.85m t
PIPE PRODUCERS
Linked to the Industrial Union of Donbass and its partners
Khartsyzsky – 76% owned directly by IUD
(2001) 300,000 t, including 135,000 t of large diameter pipes;
(capacity) 1.6 m t
Dnepropetrovsk – 21% owned directly by IUD
(Capacity) 700,000 t
Controlled by the Interpipe group
Novomoskovsky – controlled by Interpipe
(2001) 140,000 t
Nikopol pivdennotrubny (including subsidiaries Niko tube, Nikopol
stainless tube, Yuvist, Trubolit) – controlled by Interpipe
(2001) 300,000 t; capacity 1.6 m t
Nizhnedneprovsky – controlled by Interpipe and related entities
(2001) 600,000 t
Lugansk tube works – controlled by Interpipe
n/a
Foreign-controlled
Makeevsky tube casting works – owned 75%+ by Sigma-Bleyzer group
n/a
Source: companies, unless otherwise stated.
Chart reproduced from Metal Bulletin.