Russian owner pays EUR 9 mln for residual stake in Romanian pipemaker

TMK Europe, controlled by Russian billionaire Dimitri Pumpianski, has completed the buy-out offer at Romanian pipemaker TMK Artrom and paid RON 43 million (nearly EUR 9 mln) for an additional 6.1% stake in the company (84% of the shares that it was not owning already).

The Russian group has thus reached 98.8% of the company’s shares, which is above the 95% that allows it to start the procedure for delisting the company from the Bucharest Stock Exchange (BVB).

In mid-December 2019, TMK Slatina announced that its majority shareholder, which at that time had a holding of 92.7%, wanted to buy the rest up to 100% from the stock market for a price that was 42% above the trading price at that time.

TMK Artrom is in process of expanding its production capacity from 200,000 tonnes of industrial pipes annually to 320,000 tonnes by 2024, under a program started last spring. The company reported a turnover of RON 1.4 billion (EUR 300 mln) in 2018, up 18% compared to the previous year.

The industrial pipemaker in Slatina exports more than 80% of its production mostly to the European or American market. TMK Artrom also controls a steel mill in Resita, which supplies it with steel for the pipe production.

(Photo source: Facebook/TMK Artrom)