OREANDA-NEWS. November 29, 2007. Metinvest B. V. (the Netherlands), integrating mining and metallurgical assets of System Capital Management, finalized the deal on acquisition of an 82.46% stake in Ingulets Mining, the largest producer of iron-ore concentrate in Ukraine. In 2006, its share reached 61.4% (12.6 mn tonnes), which, if compared with the figures of its immediate competitors, is impressive – Southern Mining (18.4%, 3.77 mn tonnes), Central Mining (11.2%, 2.36 mn tonnes), Lebedinsk Mining (5.6%, 1.18 mn tonnes) and Northern Mining (1.1%, 233 thousand tonnes). Three largest Mining companies of Ukraine (Central, Northern and Ingulets Mining), being part of Mr Akhmetov's business empire, control about 74% of the Ukrainian iron-ore concentrate market and approximately 89% of pellets market. In this connection the explanation of the Antimonopoly Committee, which granted permission to Metinvest B.V. for this stake concentration, just knocks anybody out: "one should not consider separately Kryvy-Rih iron-ore deposit and Kursk magnetic anomaly."

The desire of Vadim Novinskiy to share his business with Rinat Akhmetov looks like a logical one, as possessing only two rather modest iron and steel enterprises, more than 90% of its product Ingulets Mining had to sell to the third parties – Mariupol Illich Iron and Steel, Zaporizhstal and Alchevsk Iron and Steel. And taking into account the recurrent conflicts between the iron-ore consumers and Ingulets Mining, which constantly increases its prices for iron ore, the steelmakers started to look for more appeasable suppliers. As a result, Vladimir Boiko periodically satisfies the needs of Mariupol Illich Iron and Steel with the supplies from Lebedinsk Mining and Mikhailovsk Mining. Industrial Union of Donbass, which controls Alchevsk Iron and Steel, began to import iron ore from Brazil; Zaporizhstal is searching suppliers in Russia. In view of the fact that in the last years the iron-ore suppliers from Brazil and Australia became more active in Europe, the situation, when Vadim Novinskiy with his ore brainchild might lose sales markets in several years, could have become quite possible. Ingulets Mining integration into the mining and metallurgy business of Mr Akhmetov will settle this problem, as Metinvest Holding has significant iron and steel assets (Azovstal and Enakievo Steel) and its strategy is aimed at output increase due to modernization and purchase of new capacities, which will allow to use a significant part of iron ore produced by Ingulets Mining inside the group.