The government will help the United Aircraft Corporation (OAK) out of the debt pit. "We will contribute several billion roubles to its authorised capital and reschedule a further 46 billion roubles of its debts over the coming years," Prime Minister Vladimir Putin announced yesterday (quoted from www.government.ru). The corporation's total debt is about 160 billion roubles, way above the acceptable level of about 100 billion roubles, two sources close to the OAK said in late November. The company would like to pay back 70 billion roubles of its debt at the expense of the budget or through the issue of OFZs (federal loan bonds), they said, but the Finance Ministry insists on rescheduling the debts for about five years, proposing subsidised rates or state guarantees. These conditions are still in force, a Finance Ministry representative said.
Eventually a compromise was worked out to relieve the debt burden both through rescheduling and injections into the authorized capital, according to an OAK representative. The company will additionally issue 45.15 billion roubles worth of shares: VEB will buy 21 billion roubles worth of shares and the state will buy the rest. The money is spread out among several items of the 2009 and 2010 budgets, he adds. Vladimir Putin was referring to the sum of 45 billion roubles when he spoke about injections into OAK's capital, says the Prime Minister's press spokesman Dmitry Peskov.
In 2009 OAK received 6 billion roubles of budget money for the leasing of civilian planes; the Kazan Aviation Plant received 4 billion roubles to redeem its debts and RSK MIG 15 billion roubles (it will get the same amount before the end of the year). So far, state assistance has been used to patch up holes and it is not until 2012 that development of the aviation industry will become a relevant topic, Aviaport analyst Oleg Panteleyev concludes.
Anastasia Dagayeva