The European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD) has acquired a stake of 1.9 percent in Romania’s natural gas producer Romgaz, for the RON equivalent of EUR 50 million.

“The EBRD Board of Directors has approved an equity investment in Romania’s partial sell-off of its shares in Societatea Nationala de Gaze Naturale Romgaz S.A. through an IPO,” reads a statement of the lender.

According to EBRD, this project’s purpose is to assist the Romanian company “in its efforts to improve its corporate governance, internal control systems and environmental management practices”.

Also, “the floating of Romgaz through the largest IPO on the Romanian capital market to-date is a test case for future listings envisaged by the Government of Romania for 2014 as part of its programme of partial sell-off of state-owned companies,” reads the EBRD statement.

The Romanian state raised some EUR 390 million via the recently finalized Initial Public Offering (IPO) of Romgaz.

More than half of the offer – 64 percent, was made of shares listed on the Bucharest Stock Exchange, while the rest was made of Global Depositary Receipts (GDR) listed on the London Stock Exchange LSE.

Following the IPO, The Romanian Ministry of Economy is reducing its stake by 15 percent, from 85 percent to 70 percent.

Romgaz reported total gas sales of EUR 586 million (RON 2.58 billion) in the first nine months of the year, down 10 percent compared to the same period in 2012.

Irina Popescu, irina.popescu@romania-insider.com