Africa-Israel Investments chairman Lev Leviev has pulled out of the public tender for Oil Refineries Haifa even though it had secured the necessary financing. The reason for the pull-out was that the structure of the tender prevented the company from owning more than 70% of the company. Instead, Africa-Israel Investments Ltd. (TASE:AFIL; Pink Sheets:AFIVY) will invest the money in other ventures around the world.
Government Companies Authority director Eyal Gabbai said that the Oil Refineries Haifa’s public tender was a great success. Over 5,500 orders were placed for shares, and the offering was oversubscribed by 23%. The state has sold its entire 100% holding in the company, with the Israel Corp.-Petrochemicals Enterprises joint venture apparently winning the controlling interest.
The Tel Aviv Stock Exchange (TASE) was due to collect the orders for Oil Refineries Haifa from Israeli and foreign bidders by 3:30 pm. The public tender was open to investment institutions who were unable to buy blocs of shares in last week’s institutional tender, or were only able to buy part of the blocs they bid for, or were unable to participate for other reasons. The institutional tender was 3.5-fold oversubscribed.
Until Africa-Israel withdrew from the tender, it was the main threat to the joint attempt by Israel Corp. (TASE: ILCO) and Israel Petrochemical Enterprises Ltd. (TASE:PTCH) (aka, the Ofer-Federman group) to take over for Oil Refineries Haifa.
Published by Globes [online], Israel business news - www.globes.co.il - on February 19, 2007
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