In Brief
EU governments not keen on bailout body European governments are not keen on setting up a bank bailout vehicle similar to the US model, European Central Bank governing council member Giorgos Provopoulos said yesterday. US Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson appealed to Congress on Tuesday to approve the $700 billion bailout for US financial firms swiftly, and has encouraged other governments to set up similar packages. «European governments are negative toward setting up a similar organization as the one envisioned by the US to take up problem loans from banks,» Provopoulos told President Karolos Papoulias in the presence of reporters. «This does not mean (governments) will not be intervening,» said Provopoulos, who is also the Greek central bank governor. Asked to comment on the global financial market turmoil, Provopoulos said upheavals in the banking system would gradually lead to stability. «There is an ongoing transformation of the banking system, which we believe will gradually lead to a normalization of the situation in the coming quarters,» he said. (Reuters) EBRD plans to invest 150 mln euros in Turkey LONDON (Reuters) – The European Bank for Reconstruction and Development plans to invest 150 million euros ($220 million) in Turkey in 2009 and 300 million euros in 2010, the bank said in a document published yesterday. The EBRD’s board of directors said on Tuesday it recommended Turkey become the development bank’s 30th country of operation, or recipient of funds, although the decision requires the final approval of the bank’s board of governors. «The bank will aim to operate in Turkey as an enterprise and transition-focused bank through appropriate project selection and structuring,» the EBRD said in its strategic review of Turkey, published on its website. Nuke tender A Turkish-Russian group was the sole bidder in a tender to build and operate Turkey’s first nuclear power plant, state-owned electricity firm TETAS’s CEO Haci Duran Gokkaya said yesterday. The bidding consortium is made up of Russian firms Atomstroyexport and Inter RAO along with Turkey’s Park Teknik Group. The tender is for the first of three planned nuclear power plants in Turkey, which is heavily dependent on energy imports, but the lack of widespread interest could be a blow to Turkey’s efforts to develop a nuclear power industry. «Because a bid has been made, the competition process will continue. The tender commission will make a decision,» Gokkaya told a meeting held to announce bidding details in the tender. The plant is planned to be built at Akkuyu near Mersin on the Mediterranean coast with a capacity of 4,000 megawatts, plus or minus 25 percent. (Reuters) Gas hike Bulgaria’s energy regulator proposed raising natural gas prices by 29 percent for the fourth quarter to enable the country’s main supplier to fund imports from Russia. The proposal follows a request for a 36 percent increase from Bulgargaz AD, which imports gas from Russia’s OAO Gazprom. The State Commission for Energy & Water Regulation will rule on the price change on Monday, Chairman Konstantin Shushulov told reporters in Sofia yesterday. If approved, the revision will also mean district heating tariffs will rise 12 percent on November 1, he said. (Bloomberg)
