Ruch still keen on Żabka

"The matter isn't closed," Ruch's president, Adam Pawłowicz, told daily Parkiet.

"I'm convinced that Ruch and Żabka are natural partners and I think that, sooner or later, Penta will make us an offer to buy [the firm]," he said.

Penta paid some zł.500 million for more than 1,800 Żabka stores in Poland. Ruch's offer for the chain was rumored to have stood at around zł.400 million, although this figure was never publicly confirmed.

Pawłowicz's instincts on a Ruch-Żabka tie-up could be right on the money. According to Martin Danko, a PR manager from Penta Investments Slovakia, the firm purchased Żabka with the intention of selling it in a few years' time. In the meantime, Penta's plans call for expansion of the convenience-store chain in both the Czech Republic and Slovakia, and possibly elsewhere.

The Treasury is Ruch's main shareholder, with a stake of around 62 percent, although the Civic Platform-led government has discussed the possibility of expediting the firm's privatization. The stake held by the Treasury is estimated to be worth approximately zł.900 million.