EDC executive: Schlumberger to mull prolongation of EDC offer

MOSCOW, Jan 15 (PRIME) -- The board of directors of U.S. oilfield servicing giant Schlumberger will discuss prolongation of an offer to buy a stake in Russia’s Eurasia Drilling Company (EDC) this week, Alexander Shokhin, head of the Russian Union of Industrialists and Entrepreneurs and chairman of EDC’s board of directors, told reporters on Tuesday.

“It will happen this week, not today. They don’t have to recall it, they only need to prolong it in order to wait for a decision,” he said.

In July 2017, EDC’s shareholders approved the sale of a 51% stake in the company to Schlumberger. In November, the Federal Antimonopoly Service’s Deputy Director Andrei Tsyganov said that the service and Schlumberger were working on a mechanism to protect the company’s investment in EDC and Russian economic interests in case of new Western sanctions.

In April 2018, Russian government’s commission for foreign investment control preliminarily approved Schlumberger’s bid to acquire between 25% plus one share and 49% in EDC. As of today, the commission is yet to finally approve the deal.

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