RBK Daily
Industrial complex “Apatit” became a “fatal” company for the former administration of YUKOS company. However, it seems that, after having dissociated itself from the former owners, the present company owner – “PhosAgro” – is succeeding in standing its ground against onslaught of officials. Yesterday “Apatit” won a subsequent victory over them by having managed to parry in the Arbitration Court the tax claims for 2001 for the amount of more than 5 billion rubles.

Yesterday the Arbitration Court of Murmansk Region pronounced its decision on one of the suits of OAO “Apatit” against the Interregional Inspectorate of the Federal Tax Service regarding major tax payers of Murmansk Region. As a court representative told the RBK daily the arbitration court declared the decision of the tax authorities to charge the tax claims to the company for 2001 in the amount of 5.04 billion rubles out of the total sum of 5.06 billion rubles as invalid one. “However, the court ruling has not yet come into force and the tax authorities have one month to challenge it”. We did not manage to contact the representatives of the tax authorities of Murmansk Region yesterday. However, a source of the RBK daily, acquainted with the progress of the case, noted that there were no such cases in his practice that the Murmansk tax authorities had not challenged rulings which were not pronounced in their favor.

Company “PhosAgro” controlling “Apatit” withheld comments having alluded to absence of the official decision. The tax claims for 2001 in the amount of 5.06 billion rubles lodged against “Apatit” in spring of the last year amounted almost to one third of the company’s proceeds for the year. It was a hard blow to “Apatit” which experienced acute need in the funds for development. However, the tax authorities decided to further continue their pressure and in December of 2005 they lodged tax claims in the amount of 2.3 billion rubles for 2002 and quite  recently – in the amount of 4.3 billion rubles for 2003.

As Mikhail Stiskin from “Troika Dialog” believes, the total amount of claims would put the enterprise under the threat of bankruptcy. “The company’s EBITDA amounted to 116 million US dollars in 2005, so it was practically impossible to pay more than 430 million US dollars”, - he commented to the RBK daily. – “At that, “Apatit” stated in its accounts its liabilities on potential payments for 2001 and 2002 having reduced the retained net income for 250 million US dollars”. As a result, the company finished the year of 2005 with a loss of 4.9 billion rubles, and three quarters of this year with a loss of 1.8 billion rubles. In that way, Rosimuschestvo which tried to return 20% of the shares of “Apatit” to the ownership of the State through a court could completely get the enterprise through the bankruptcy procedure.
However, the functionaries lost the dispute on restitution of 20% of the shares of “Apatit” to the State. Afterwards, it became known that the functionaries also yielded to the company regarding the issue of deliveries of apatite raw materials to the processing enterprises of “PhosAgro”. Conclusion of the respective transactions was being blocked by the State during several months, but finally the company concluded direct three-year contracts.

As experts believe, “Apatit” probably managed to enter into an amicable agreement with the authorities. “It is quite possible that these events form links of the same chain occurred in consequence of the agreements concluded by the company” – remarks Mikhail Stiskin. In the opinion of Georgy Ivanin from IK “Antanta Capital” the latest news may exert a positive effect upon the value of the company’s shares either. “However, they are not very marketable, - he notes, - but the company most likely will manage to contest the remaining tax claims for 2002 and 2003”.

OAO “Apatit” is the largest producer of apatite and nipheline concentrates (raw materials used for production of fertilizers) in Russia which makes part of the “PhosAgro” holding. “Apatit” obtained 7 million tons of apatite concentrate for ten months of 2006. The proceeds of “Apatit” for three months of 2006 amounted to 14.4 billion rubles while the net loss was 1.8 billion rubles.