PHS privatization under threat over demands from its future inverstor

The privatization process of the Polish Steel Mills (PHS) seems to be endangered, as the future investor, Indian LNM Holdings, demanded the right to control the company before having actually paid a penny. "We've proposed signing so-called observer agreement, under which LNM would be informed by PHS on decisions being taken. The future investor also wants to be sure that financial results of PHS do not differ from the forecasts." - said an anonymous source in LNM. While spokesman for PHS, Andrzej Krzyształowski underlined that the investor meant "consulting" the decisions and not "influencing" or "controlling", still, the company is known to have refused the demand. "LNM has carried out due diligence a few weeks ago. [...] LNM has not entered PHS yet. At the moment it's a competitor, not an investor" - argued one of the representatives of the Polish company. (Puls Biznesu, p. 6) M.K.