The company with the biggest copper reserves in Romania, CupruMin Abrud, which will be privatised in the next few months, hasreceived new letters of intent from companies in India and Turkey,after February saw investors from Austria, Australia, Switzerlandand Canada, as well as Cupru Min employees join the race toprivatise the company.
The interest for the company is increasingly high after it managedto return to profit last year, with a 19 million-lei (4.5million-euro) result, following a significant increase in the priceof copper, which recently reached an all-time high of 10,000dollars/tonne.
Cupru Min holds mining licences for Roşia Poieni copper quarry fromwhich around 900,000 tonnes of copper can be extracted, accountingfor around 60% of Romania's copper reserves. The Roşia Poienideposits are valued at around 6 billion euros if one considers theprice at which copper is currently traded on the London StockExchange, of around 9,500 dollars/tonne.
Cupru Min Abrud last year produced around 5,000 tonnes of copperand increased its turnover 5.7 times, to 115.3 million lei (27.4million euros).
However, the negative results in the previous years, which led to asignificant amount of debt to the state budget piling up, hasprompted IMF representatives to ask the state to privatise thecompany, which also needs significant investments to make thecompany more efficient, given its use of outdated technologies.
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