Data on deals in oil and gas sector released

Some 344 mergers and acquisitions totaling $5bn were made in the Russian oil and gas sector in 2002. The amount of deals grew by 37 percent against the results in 2001, Irina Ganayeva, the deputy director of the financial consulting department of KPMG Russia, declared at an international forum devoted to mergers and acquisitions in the Russian oil and gas sector in Moscow today. According to her, in 2003 there will be a considerable advance in such deals, which is testified to by the results in the period from January to April 2003 when the total amount of such deals was $4.8bn.

She mentioned that some 48 percent of all acquisitions and mergers in Russia were made in the manufacturing industry, 22 percent in the IT sector, 21 percent in the sector of the natural resources production and 16 percent in the oil and gas sector. Some 22 deals totaling $813m in the oil and gas sector were accomplished in Russia in 2002, she added.