The state is preparing a repeat auction for the privatization of Odesa Port Plant (OPP) to find a strategic investor, possibly at a reduced price, according to the Ministry of Economy, Environment, and Agriculture after the auction scheduled for November 25 with a starting price of UAH 4.49 billion failed due to a lack of participants.
“The conditions for privatizing this asset were difficult from the outset, as the facility requires significant investment and specialized expertise. There is interest in the company on the market, but at the same time, international partners have emphasized the need for additional time and adjustments to certain conditions for full participation,” the Ministry of Economy said in a statement on Telegram.
The ministry added that in the current conditions of martial law and high risks, large industrial assets face a number of objective challenges: for OPZ, these are not only market conditions and security factors, but also the total cost, which may exceed the starting price, in particular, investment obligations.
“In order to increase the chances of selling assets at market value, the ministry supported a bill by a group of MPs that provides for the possibility of putting up large privatization objects with a gradual reduction in the starting price,” the message says.
The Ministry of Economy reminded the auction winner of the main investment obligations: to maintain the main activities of the plant; to invest at least UAH 500 million in the modernization of facilities and the development of production; repay within 12 months the debts on wages and to the budget, which as of the end of June 2025 exceeded UAH 366.8 million; gradually repay overdue accounts payable (except for claims of sanctioned persons and structures associated with the Russian Federation/Belarus) and comply with environmental and social standards.
OPZ’s revenue for January-June this year amounted to UAH 322.63 million, while its net loss was UAH 280.79 million. In 2024, the plant increased its revenue to UAH 944.22 million from UAH 494.57 million a year earlier, but its net loss increased to UAH 1 billion 839.3 million from UAH 1 billion 94.58 million.
Acting Chairman of the Board and Director of OPZ Yuriy Kovalsky said in an interview with NV Business in August this year that in August 2024, the plant’s management tried to launch one of the two ammonia units, but this step was not successful. Since then, OPZ has been converted to grain transshipment, and this activity has been the company’s only source of income, but at the end of June, as a result of a Russian air attack, the storage facilities were significantly damaged, which suspended transshipment operations. According to Kovalsky, OPZ’s partner in grain transshipment is the trader V AGRO LLC. In the 2024-2025 marketing year, approximately 638,000 tons of grain were transshipped: 625,000 tons of corn and 12,700 tons of soybeans.
The acting chairman of the board also said that OPZ had significantly optimized its costs, sold non-core assets, and was actively working with creditors, in particular Naftogaz of Ukraine, to offer a future investor a viable debt structure of about UAH 2.5 billion.
Kovalsky noted that for security reasons, OPZ does not plan to resume production in the near future, but is maintaining its production lines in full technical readiness so that it can resume operations as soon as possible. He estimated the cost of restarting the plant at approximately 30 million cubic meters of gas.
Ukraine has tried several times to privatize the enterprise, but without success. In 2009, the winner of the tender for the sale of OPZ was Nortima, a company controlled by the former owner of PrivatBank, Ihor Kolomoisky, for UAH 5 billion. However, the tender commission refused to recognize the company as the winner due to the low price and suspicion of collusion among the participants, and declared the tender invalid.
Then, in 2016, Ukraine twice put 99.567% of OPZ shares up for sale: in July at a starting price of UAH 13.175 billion, and in December at a reduced price of UAH 5.16 billion, but both times without success. The lack of interest in Odesa Port Plant was linked, in particular, to its debt of over $250 million to Dmitry Firtash’s structures, as confirmed by the Stockholm Arbitration Court.
At the end of July 2018, the State Property Fund of Ukraine selected a consortium led by Pericles Global Advisory, consisting of White&Case LLP, Kinstellar, KPMG Ukraine, and SARS Capital, as an investment advisor for the privatization of Odesa Port Plant. Before the coronavirus crisis, it was expected that the company could be put up for sale as early as August 2020, but the Fund then postponed these plans until 2021 and ultimately did not implement them. In the last years before the war, fertilizer production at the company was carried out intermittently on a tolling basis.
