Exclusive: Kazakh mining company ERG looks to spin off and list assets – sources – by Clara Denina and Dasha Afanasieva (Reuters U.s. – February 22, 2018)

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LONDON (Reuters) – Kazakh mining company Eurasian Resources Group (ERG), formerly known as ENRC, is working on a plan to eventually spin off and list some of its assets to help repay debt, three banking sources said.

The company, then called Eurasian National Resources Corporation (ENRC), was taken private by its three founders and the Kazakh government in 2013 in a $4.5 billion buyout, six years after listing on the London stock exchange.

While listed in London, the company was dogged by boardroom battles, weak commodity prices and an investigation into fraud and bribery at some of its subsidiaries.

ERG, which is registered in Luxembourg, has ferrochrome, aluminum, iron ore and energy operations in Kazakhstan, copper and cobalt assets in Africa and iron ore mines in Brazil.

The assets sales will help ERG pay off some of its debt, the sources said. VTB agreed last year to extend the terms covering $3 billion of ERG’s debt to 2022. As of July 2016, ERG owed $5.8 billion to its main creditors, VTB (VTBR.MM) and Sberbank (SBER.MM).

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