MOSCOW (MRC) -- France has received five bids to buy a troubled oil refinery, including the two considered to be serious and well-financed, according to Reuters.
The Petit-Couronne refinery in Western France, now in receivership, was among a string of industrial facilities new French President Francois Hollande had promised to protect before being elected.
The refinery is in trouble after its owner, Swiss-based company Petroplus Holdings AG, filed for protection from creditors.
The two bids deemed serious come from investors in Egypt and Switzerland.
The refinery has a capacity of 161,000 bpd, according to news reports.
We remind that, as MRC wrote previously, in February, 2012, Royal Dutch Shell had signed a contract to hire the French refinery owned by insolvent Swiss-based refiner Petroplus to process crude oil for six months. Resuming operations at the refinery, which was gradually shut down in January, required EUR50 million investment. Shell should have transferred EUR20 million to the refinery in advance of future payments to the refinery. The government should have financed the remaining EUR30 million.
In December, Shell ended a six-month oil processing deal with the troubled plant and has not extended the contract, making the refinery less attractive for buyers due to expensive re-start costs.
Petroplus, one of the largest independent European refiners, was forced to file for insolvency in late January after struggling for months with weak demand due to the economic slowdown in Europe and overcapacity amid tighter credit conditions, high crude prices and competition from Asia and the Middle East.
MRC