“The purchase and sale process is ongoing. A decision to buy the shares has been taken since Statoil is pulling out for some reasons and has decided to sell the shares,” Mestilla CEO Arūnas Zubas told BNS adding that Akola should own around 80 percent of Mestilla’s shares after the closure of the deal if everything went as planned.
Zubas would not say why Statoil had decided to sell the shares.
The Lithuanian Competition Council cleared the purchase of up to 100 percent of Mestilla’s shares by Akola last Friday.
Until now, Linas Agro Group's shareholders held a controlling stake in Mestilla, including Denmark's Akola with 30.9 percent and Darius Zubas with 12.06 percent. Norway's Statoil owned the remaining 49 percent.
Mestilla produces about 100,000 tons of biodiesel fuel annually. The company exports about 80 percent of its products to Scandinavia and Western Europe, with the rest sold to the domestic market.
The company‘s revenues rose by 19 percent in its 2010-2011 business year, compared with the previous year. It aims to achieve the sales of 477 million litas (EUR 138.3m) in its 2011-2012 business year.
