Golden share option for Petrom?

Romanian authorities have yet to decide whether to retain control over Petrom after privatisation, through the so-called “golden share”, a mechanism that will allow them to keep the veto right for significant decisions even after selling the controlling interests in the company. “The consultant came to us and said: you have to deal with this issue (i.e. the golden share),” Doru Laurian Badulescu, head of the Office for State’s Interests and Industrial Privatisation (OPSPI) told Ziarul Financiar. Holding a golden share could give the Romanian State the right to make decisions about mergers or break-ups of the company, for instance. Other CEE companies, such as Hungary’s Mol, where the State still holds the control share more than ten years after privatisation, have used this solution so far. The options for privatising Petrom, as explained by Badulescu, are either the strategic sale, that is selling a stake along with a capital increase so that the strategic investor would eventually get at least 51%, releasing an IPO on the international markets or a combination of the two, that is selling a stake and releasing an IPO. ZF