Judge Leonard P. Stark’s order establishes the hiring of investment bank Evercore Group and directs an approach to the US Department of the Treasury to seek a decision on any sale of Citgo shares
A US federal judge approved and presented on Tuesday, October 11, an auction schedule to sell shares of PDV Holding, the parent company of Citgo Petroleum, whose sale process could be completed in early 2024.
The order of United States District Judge Leonard P. Stark established the bidding and sale procedures, the hiring of the investment bank Evercore Group and directs an approach to the US Treasury Department to seek a decision on any sale of shares.
The Treasury had protected citgo of creditors by not allowing transactions beforehand, review Reuters.
Last year, the Delaware district court judge approved the sale of shares of PDV Holding, whose only assets are Citgo shares, to pay Canadian miner Crystallex an amount of 970 million dollars.
Crystallex’s lawyer, Rahim Moloo, told the agency that the funds are willing to liquidate as the refiner now “has liquidity” to pay the $970 million outstanding from an expropriation judgment to avoid a share auction.
This debt is pending a trial of expropriation of its Venezuelan assets, the news agency recalled in its report.
For his part, Horacio Medina, head of the PDV ad-hoc board appointed by opposition leader Juan Guaidó, stated that “there is space to explore alternative options”, although it will not be easy to deal with the funds that obtained litigation rights on behalf of Crystallex.
*Also read: Guaidó shows possible payment agreement to Conoco Phillips thanks to Citgo results
In the judge’s document signed on October 7, the auction plan establishes a period of six months to receive a response from the US Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC). Also a period of nine months to execute the sale of Citgo shares to remedy some $2.2 billion in compensation.
It is expected that other pending claims that Venezuela has in the US courts could be added to this court order, such as that of the 2020 bondholders, bonds that went into default and whose guarantee is half of the shares of Citgo.
With information from Reuters
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