OREANDA-NEWS.   An Agreement of Cooperation as part of liquefied natural gas (LNG) projects was signed today at the Gazprom headquarters by Alexey Miller, Chairman of the Gazprom Management Committee and Andrey Akimov, Chairman of the Gazprombank Management Board.

According to the Agreement, the parties will cooperate within the Baltic LNG and Vladivostok LNG projects.

Gazprom will be the majority shareholder in the project companies set up to implement the Baltic LNG and Vladivostok LNG projects. Gazprombank will have an opportunity to acquire a stake in the project companies.

The project companies, among other things, will own LNG plants along with other necessary production facilities as well as manage the projects at all stages, including the development of project documents.

According to the document, Gazprombank jointly with Gazprom will hold negotiations with international and Russian financial institutions to obtain equity and external financing for the project companies.

Gazprom will support the project companies, inter alia by selecting appropriate sites for LNG plants, obtaining land lease/acquisition rights required for the construction and providing the LNG projects with necessary volumes of natural gas.

Gazprombank will prepare a detailed plan of financing the projects and submit it to Gazprom.

Background

Gazprom is successfully developing the LNG sales and transportation segment. At present, Gazprom supplies LNG to ten countries. The Company's goal is to build up its presence in the promising markets, at first place, through increasing its own production. Gazprom expects to raise its share from 5 to 15 per cent in the international LNG market as soon as the Vladivostok LNG and Baltic LNG projects are commissioned.
The Vladivostok LNG project provides for the construction of an LNG plant with an annual capacity of 10 million tons in the Primorye Territory with the potential for further expansion. The project entered the investment stage in February 2013. The first train will be brought onstream in 2018.
The Baltic LNG project provides for the construction of an LNG plant with an annual capacity of up to 10 million tons in the Leningrad Region. The Investment Rationale for the project will be completed in the first half of 2014.
Gazprombank is among Russia's three largest banks by key performance indicators and among Central and Eastern Europe's top three banks in terms of equity capital. Gazprombank has an investment-level rating assigned by the international ratings agency Moody's Investor's Service – the long-term foreign currency deposits rating is at Baa3 with a stable outlook and the debt rating is at Baa3. Standard & Poor's awarded the bank with its long-term counterparty credit rating and debt rating at BBB- with a stable outlook. Fitch Ratings assigned the long-term issuer default rating of BBB-, stable outlook, to the bank.