Golden Telecom

History

2021: Company Closure

In April 2021, it became known about the closure of Golden Telecom about 13 years after its purchase by VimpelCom. The liquidation of the relevant legal entity is reported in the report of the Big Four operator.

The company did not disclose specific assets that were attached as a result of the liquidation. However, the operator brought to the discussion of shareholders the issue of buying back shares from a number of legal entities, including Sovintel Group LLC, Lease EU LLC, Kubtelecom LLC and Sakhalin Telecom LLC. According to Interfax, all companies previously belonged to Golden Telecom. An extraordinary meeting of shareholders on this issue is scheduled for May 20, 2021.

VimpelCom liquidated Golden Telecom

The cost of repurchasing shares will be 2800 rubles per ordinary share and 0.017 rubles per class A preferred share. Thus, taking into account the repurchase price of ordinary shares, VimpelCom is estimated at 143.6 billion rubles (the number of issued shares of the company is 51,281,022 pieces), or about $1.85 billion. For investors, these parameters can be of only theoretical interest: what is the estimate of the value of the Russian Veon business, which generates up to 50% of the holding's revenue. Veon's market capitalization by April 2021 is a little more than $3 billion, while at its peak the figure reached $30 billion.

2008: VimpelCom bought Golden Telecom for $4.3 billion

VimpelCom bought Golden Telecom in 2008 for $4.3 billion. At that time, it was the most expensive acquisition in the history of the Russian communications industry, and for the sake of its implementation, VimpelCom paid a premium of $200 million.

According to Interfax, at that time there was an opinion on the telecom market that it was the expensive acquisition, coupled with the effect of the financial crisis, that forced VimpelCom to reduce the investment program, allowing competitors to take away part of the share in the Russian market from the company.^[1]

Notes