Ellaktor secures mega-deal with Motor Oil

The Vardinogiannis Group, which controls Athens-listed fuel company Motor Oil, has reached a major deal worth more than 930 million euros with the shareholders of construction group Ellaktor – Dutch group Reggeborgh Invest and Greek shipowners Giannis Kaimenakis and Dimitris Bakos.

At first the Vardinogiannis Group will take over the stake of the two shipowners in Ellaktor, amounting to 29.87%, while it is negotiating the acquisition of 75% of the group’s renewable energy sources arm.

Motor Oil confirmed in a bourse filing on Friday that it has agreed to buy 104 million shares belonging to the two shipowners through the Kiloman and Greenhill Investments vehicles, at a price of €1.75 per share, for a sum of €182 million.

Bakos and Kaimenakis announced that the deal brings an end to a long period of disputes within Ellaktor, after the rejection by Reggeborgh of their proposal to buy its shares in the Greek construction company.

The Vardinogiannis Group has agreed to a provisional deal for taking over 75% of Ellaktor’s RES activities, with the creation of a new company to absorb the RES portfolio that currently amounts to 493 megawatts, as well as a series of projects under construction with a total capacity in excess of 1.6 gigawatts. It has been agreed that the value of that company amounts to €1 billion, meaning that the 75% stake Motor Oil will acquire will come to €750 million.

There are multiple benefits for Ellaktor from this mega-deal: First, it ends the clash between the Dutch shareholders and the two shipowners that had reached the courts. Obtaining a powerful ally will also give creditors and competitors a strong message about the return of the group to major infrastructure works and concession contracts in the next decade.

At the same time the possible sale of the RES arm will offer the group precious capital for the definitive emergence of Ellaktor from the years-long crisis created by its losses of hundreds of millions of euros.