PGNiG fuels up for bourse with giant loan agreement

"The whole sum will be earmarked for paying off our current debts. In this way we will finish the financial restructuring of the company, " declared PGNiG president Marek Kossowski. The members of the consortium, namely, Bank Handlowy, Societe Generale, Caylon Bank, Fortis Bank and PKO BP as well as the representatives of PGNiG claim that the new loan is more beneficial than the old ones, which will be replaced by it, and that it will allow the lowering of the financial costs of the company. "The conditions included in the loan agreement give us much more freedom in managing the company's equity than we've had so far," declared Marek Pajewski, the head of PGNiG's finance department. PGNiG's president also stated that the company's debt is systematically decreasing and at the end of H1 this year amounted to zł.3.2 billion in comparison with zł.4.2 billion at the end of 2004. Kossowski added that in order to finalize its development program, the value of which is estimated at zł.8.2 billion, the company still needs to issue shares for zł.1.5 billion and debut on the bourse. (Puls Biznesu, pp. 1, 6) E.B.