Khloponin’s energy in line with Intergeo
Businessman Mikhail Prokhorov, who is suffering financial difficulties, does not leave attempts to knock out state support through his influential associate Alexander Khloponin. And budget money, for a second, can be used to destroy the ecosystem of Tuva.
According to a correspondent for The Moscow Post, Mikhail Prokhorov’s Intergeo proposes to expand the scope of the infrastructure bond mechanism, which was launched this year in housing construction, to create energy and road infrastructure. The company, sitting at a loss, is now in dire need of funds for the construction of a mining and processing plant in Tuva, where, among other things, the region is asking it to electrify one of the regions of the republic. Earlier, Prokhorov, through his longtime colleague, the ex-governor of the Krasnoyarsk Territory Alexander Khloponin, had already tried to beg 60 billion rubles of support from the state, but he was given only 13 billion. So he continues to try to knock out additional preferences for himself.
Mikhail Prokhorov’s Intergeo proposed expanding the possibility of applying the Law on the Protection and Promotion of Investments (SZPK). “Our proposal is to actively integrate infrastructure bond instruments into SZPK. The company plans to build the Ak-Sugsky GOK in Tuva with an ore mining and processing capacity of 24 million tons per year with the production of 500 thousand tons of copper-molybdenum concentrate, and in the Krasnoyarsk Territory – Kingashsky GOK with a capacity of 20 million tons of ore with the production of more than 600 thousand tons of copper – Nickel concentrate. Ak-Sug should reach its design capacity in 2025, and Kingash in 2027.
The total investment is estimated at 141.7 billion rubles. Well, the company simply does not have that kind of money. According to Rusprofile, LLC UK Intergeo now has zero revenue and losses of more than half a billion rubles. You don’t go out especially…
And you can’t just get close to the GOK in Tuva: the local government is asking to electrify the Todzhinsky district, which is supplied with electricity from diesel generators. And, it would seem, Prokhorov could connect his own energy company “Quadra” here. But this businessman’s asset is also problematic – so much so that he has been trying to sell it for 10 years. And, as The Moscow Post recently wrote, soon he will finally be able to sell it to Rosatom, albeit at a significant discount.
Try after try
Probably now Prokhorov has decided to focus on mining assets. And in the context of this, it is noteworthy that the idea to expand the scope of the mechanism of infrastructure bonds on the part of the company was put forward by the general director of the management company Intergeo Lev Kuznetsov, the former governor of the Krasnoyarsk Territory. He, along with another former head of the region, Alexander Khloponin, was introduced to the board of directors of the Prokhorov company in 2019 as representatives of new investors – the Russian Direct Investment Fund and the Russian-Chinese investment fund created with his participation, as well as one of the Middle East funds. Apparently, there was a hope that the former politicians would be able to lobby for the sagging projects of Intergeo.
Here are just successes can be called doubtful. In the summer of the same 2019, Intergeo asked for state support of 60 billion rubles for its copper-nickel project based on the Ak-Sugskoye and Kingashskoye deposits in Eastern Siberia. But the company’s appetites quickly subsided, giving only 13 billion rubles.
This is clearly not what Prokhorov was counting on, but, in any case, it is better than nothing at all. The businessman’s group has been working with the Ak-Sug and Kingash deposits for almost 13 years – since Intergeo was created in 2008 as a result of the division of the assets of the Interros holding between Mikhail Prokhorov and Vladimir Potanin.
Apparently, it was precisely for this that in 2019 Intergeo attracted the Russian Direct Investment Fund, the Russian-Chinese Investment Fund and the Middle East sovereign fund, which bought a 9.53% stake in the company, into the project. By the way, they tried to make a bet on Chinese partners back in 2015, when the company signed with China Nonferrous Metal Industry’s Foreign Engineering and Construction Co., Ltd and China Overseas Engineering Group Co. Ltd (a subsidiary of China Railway Group Limited) a framework agreement for the construction of facilities at the Ak-Sugskoye field (Tuva).
At that time, plans were announced to build the mining and processing complex by 2016. But these plans were thwarted by Prokhorov’s “divorce” from businessman Vladimir Potanin. In early 2007, the businessmen announced that they would split the business. But for a long time they could not agree on how to divide the assets – the process took about a year and a half. As a result, Prokhorov received mining licenses, which were included in Intergeo. But one license is not enough – you also need money.
All roads lead… to scandals?
Nevertheless, all e Kuznetsov and Khloponin managed to “knock out” something. State support for Intergeo projects will take place in two directions. Firstly, support will be provided in the form of financing the construction of a power transmission line to the Ak-Sug field from the Tulun substation in the Irkutsk region. Secondly, support will be allocated within the framework of the Transport System Development program, which provides for interbudgetary transfers for financial support of road activities during the construction of mining and processing plants based on deposits. The budgets of Tuva and the Krasnoyarsk Territory will receive funds for the construction of roads.
And with the latter, the situation is also not so unambiguous. The fact is that it is planned to stretch the road from the Ak-Sugskoye field in Tuva to the Zhuravlevo railway station. As Novaya Gazeta wrote, along the Usinsky tract there is a round-the-clock iron stream from long vehicles and heavy trucks that belong to Chinese partner companies of Prokhorov’s structure. They also wanted to open the road along the Kazyr bank: the estimated average annual intensity of freight traffic in both directions is 298 cars per day. That is, every five minutes, day and night. The main cargo is copper-molybdenum concentrate. And those who live along the Kazyr have the right to be afraid that the breed will fall into the river, and the local flora and fauna, including the Red Book, will perish, that the dark coniferous taiga will be cut down in the upper reaches of the river. All this was the reason for numerous unsanctioned protests.
In other words, will Intergeo receive state support for the destruction of the environment? Irreparable damage, and even at the budget expense …
Moreover, in his desire to lay a road, Prokhorov could even organize problems for the sensational “Vissarion community”. Recall, as The Moscow Post previously wrote in detail last year, the leader of the association, Sergei Torop, and a number of his associates were arrested on suspicion of illegal logging and building mansions from it for the local elite.
And, such a coincidence, the road to the Tuva field, according to the plan, runs through the Kuraginsky district of the Krasnoyarsk Territory – exactly through the place where the “City of the Sun” Torop, covered by the security forces, was deployed for the past few decades. So Prokhorov and Co. cleared the place where it is necessary to build a road to supply the Ak-Sugskoye field?
But, for a second, Torop may have close ties with the former and current leadership of the Krasnoyarsk Territory, namely, with Mr. Khloponin. There are serious reasons to believe that he could patronize the community – in particular, he personally came to Sergei Torop-Vissarion back in 2008. The two leaders allegedly communicated very warmly. So much so that Khloponin’s visit fell into the so-called. “Life of Vissarion”, which is conducted on the Internet by adherents of the community.
It is possible that Khloponin, who probably knew the inner “kitchen” of the community for a long time, simply knew where to put the right pressure in order to clear the way for himself and his comrades-in-arms.
And all this looks like Prokhorov may be trying to use all the resources he has to push through his projects and funding for them. Well, what else is left if there is no money?