Usmanov’s Metalloinvest Buys 24% Stake in Company From Owners

Metalloinvest, the Russian iron-ore producer partly owned by billionaire Alisher Usmanov, agreed to buy back a 24 percent stake from its owners, a statement from the company shows.

Metalloinvest Ltd., a subsidiary of Metalloinvest Holding Co. bought the stake after OAO VTB sold its shares in the holding company, the Moscow-based iron ore producer said in an e-mailed statement today, without giving any financial details.

Metalloinvest Ltd. now owns a 24 percent stake in the holding company, which is 100 percent owned by Usmanov’s USM Holdings, the statement shows.

VTB, Russia’s second-largest lender bought a Metalloinvest stake from billionaire Vasily Anisimov last year for $2.5 billion. Metalloinvest had started preliminary talks to buy back shares in the mining company held by VTB, Usmanov said in April.

The company, the nation’s largest iron ore producer, planned to exchange $2.48 billion in VTB promissory notes for the stake, Vedomosti reported in May, citing people it didn’t identify.

Metalloinvest is yet to decide what to do with the shares, once they are repurchased from VTB, Eduard Potapov, chief executive officer, told reporters this month. An initial public offering is unlikely next year or in 2014, he said.

To contact the reporter on this story: Yuliya Fedorinova in Moscow at yfedorinova@bloomberg.net

To contact the editor responsible for this story: John Viljoen at jviljoen@bloomberg.net