CMI offered HRK 37 million for the shares of the former Sisak ironworks, specifying that it would pay HRK 10 million immediately and the remaining 27 million once VCS cancelled the annex to the agreement with Italian company Pipex granting it the exclusive right to distribute the products of the Sisak company, Deputy PM Damir Polanec recalled.
Polancec said that CMI was a serious company and that it offered to keep 1,209 workers at VCS and 207 workers at Remont Caprag for the next three years.
CMI is a part of the US company Commercial Metals Company (CMC), whose annual sales in 2006 amounted to USD 7.5 billion. Its market capitalisation exceeds USD 6.5 billion.
In terms of market capitalisation, this is the strongest company to take part in the privatisation process in Croatia so far, Polancec said.
The government also gave its consent for the conclusion of a EUR 35.3 million loan agreement between the Rijeka Port Authority and the World Bank to finance additional costs related to the road improvement segment of the Rijeka Gateway Project.
The additional costs amount to slightly more than EUR 40 million. The World Bank is expected to borrow EUR 35.3 million, and the government will secure the remaining five million from the state budget.
The road improvement segment of the Rijeka Gateway Project, amounting to some EUR 320 million, is expected to be completed in 2009.
The government today also sent to parliament the final bill on changes to the Law on Incentives for Small Enterprises, defining new criteria for the classification of enterprises into micro, small and medium-sized ones.