Eurohold bids for Czech utility CEZ's Bulgarian assets (updated)

EuroHold Bulgaria AD

01/04/2019 16:08

(Adds detail, quote)
    SOFIA, April 1 (Reuters) - Eurohold Bulgaria  4EH.BB  said
on Monday it had filed a binding offer to acquire Bulgarian
assets of Czech power utility CEZ  CEZP.PR , which earlier said
it had also received an offer from India Power. 
    Bulgaria's public holding company Eurohold, which is active
in insurance and asset management, said its offer is not linked
to other bidders and it will finance the purchase with its own
funds and with the backing of leading western European banks.
    "The intention to acquire CEZ Group's assets in Bulgaria is
part of Sofia-based holding company's long-term strategy to
penetrate in new regulated business segments that provide large
opportunities for sustainable growth," Eurohold Bulgaria's
management board member Vasil Stefanov said.
    Energy prices are politically sensitive in the European
Union's poorest member state, where a 2013 spike in electricity
bills toppled Prime Minister Boyko Borissov's first government.
    CEZ had been in talks with Bulgaria's Inercom, but the
country's anti-monopoly regulator blocked a deal last July and
Inercom filed an appeal.  urn:newsml:reuters.com:*:nL5N1UQ3L5  urn:newsml:reuters.com:*:nL8N21J4CO
    In February 2018 CEZ signed a contract to sell a power
distributor that provides electricity to more than three million
Bulgarians, together with other assets in Bulgaria, to Inercom
for an estimated 320 million euros ($359.10 million).
($1 = 0.8911 euros)

 (Reporting by Tsvetelia Tsolova and Angel Krasimirov
Editing by David Goodman and Alexander Smith)
 ((tsvetelia.tsolova@thomsonreuters.com; +359-2-93-99-731;))