Treasury shortlists three to negotiate purchase of GZE energy distributor

Probably next week the Treasury Ministry will hold initial meetings with three companies, which were selected for the first round of final phase talks to purchase 10 to 25% of shares of the largest Polish energy distributor Gornoslaskie Zaklad Energetyczny (GZE). These companies are PSEG Poland Distribution, Swedish Vattenfall, and German RWE Energie and probably by the end of August one of them will acquire shares of GZE. There is also the possibility that the Treasury will create a shorter shortlist after these meetings. The finalists were chosen after eight of the more than ten bidders performed due diligence on GZE and six of them placed binding offers. Companies, which were refused further talks, were French EDF in consortium with German EnBW, Belgian partnership Electrabel, which is partially owned by Tractebel, Elektrowni Polaniec and Preussen Elektra. GZE has 12% market share in Poland, provides energy to 60,000 firms and also over 1 million individual customers. It had revenues of zl. 2.078 billion and net profits over zl. 24 million. (Prawo i Gospodarka, page 3, Reuters) M.M.