Sberbank May Sell $1 Billion of Russian Oil Assets This Year

OOO Sberbank Capital, a unit of Russia’s largest lender, plans to sell its Dulisma oilfield in eastern Siberia and 35.5 percent of the Taas-Yuriakh venture this year, General Director Ashot Khachaturyants said.

Dulisma is valued at $300 million, while the whole Taas- Yuriakh venture is valued at $1.5 billion to $2 billion, Khachaturyants said today in Moscow. OAO Bashneft expressed interest in the assets, he said.

OAO Sberbank took over the fields as settlement of $630 million in debt from Urals Energy Plc. Urals had planned to produce 75,000 barrels of oil a day from its share in the two assets by 2013.

Russian billionaire Vladimir Yevtushenkov’s holding company AFK Sistema, which controls Bashneft, sees no forthcoming deal with Sberbank on the assets, the Moscow-based company’s press service said in an e-mail. Sistema is interested in buying new deposits, according to the statement.

Dulisma holds 464 million barrels of proven and probable reserves and was scheduled to produce 30,000 barrels a day this year, Urals Energy said in a January 2008 release. The company also estimated that its stake in Taas Yuriakh brought it 272 million barrels of proven and probable reserves and targeted 45,000 barrels a day in output from its share by 2013.

The fields are near Russia’s East Siberian Pacific Ocean pipeline, which is being expanded from a point near the Chinese border to the Pacific port of Kozmino. Russia began supplying China with 300,000 barrels a day of oil this year via the link and China last year asked when supplies could be doubled.

Oil produced from fields in East Siberia is also eligible for tax exemptions as Russia seeks to develop the remote region.

To contact the reporter on this story: Anton Doroshev in Moscow at adoroshev@bloomberg.net

Stephen Bierman in Moscow sbierman1@bloomberg.net.

To contact the editor responsible for this story: Patrick Henry at phenry8@bloomberg.net