PF prospects in oil field companies

PFI Issue 80

Two large oil field supply companies, Upetrom and Sterom, have "huge scope" for project-finance investment, according to the banker who will play a lead role in privatising them over the coming year. Klaus Requat, the Romanian director at Creditanstalt Investment Bank, which has the mandate to negotiate the sale of 40 Romanian companies to strategic foreign investors, said the two oil field suppliers required massive investment in their production facilities, after years of neglect during the Ceaucescu years. They were nevertheless bankable propositions, he said, due to the technical proficiency of their workforces and the export markets for their products, notably in Russia and Ukraine.