Creditors seek to change auction to maiximise price (520 words)

Published: 8/9/2000

The An-124-100 parked at Maastricht for the last three years has been put up for auction to pay outstanding parking and maintenance fees of $1.5m, but the deal supposed to be completed by the 8th August is causing problems for the Dutch auctioneers Meerman. According to R Marenos of Meerman, the original auction was supposed to have closed on the 4th August and the auctioneer had received six $25,000 deposits from the Russia, the Ukraine, US, UK and Ireland to participate in the tender. It appears however, that some of the creditors most notably Moscow based Imperial Bank, now in bankruptcy, but who have a call on the aircraft as collateral from the aircraft's owners, cargo charterer Moscow based Ajax. Are unhappy with the sealed bids auction, arguing that they will not receive the fullest price for the aircraft. They have therefore gone to the Dutch courts asking for the process to be changed. According to reports this legal move cancelled the first auction, which only received two full bids according to Meerman, but was turned down by the courts, which have left the original system of closed bids in place for a second auction. The tender will be rediscussed with creditors early next week and if agreement is reached then an auction will occur within 14 days. It appears however, that the disputes between the 3-5 creditors remain unresolved and an agreement is unlikely, therefore throwing the dispute potentially back into the Dutch judicial system and postponing a settlement for as much as two years in the view of Meerman. The bidders for the aircraft are rumoured to be the two largest operators of An-124s Antonov Airlines and Volga Dnepr, but it is unclear who the potential bidders for the UK, US and Ireland are. For any non Russian/CIS buyer the aircraft poses a major operational challenge as it will have to return to either Kiev or Ulyanovsk for certification, so any ongoing disputes relating to the aircraft's title or settlement on its disposal will have to be resolved, to avoid further complications. Considerable speculation surrounds the price for the aircraft, which has been parked outside at the airport, with prices ranging from $15-$25m, substantially less than the reported cost of $90m cited by Aviastar, the original producers, to Aeroflot in 1994, althugh it is unclear whether the latter ever owned the aircraft. It seems likely according to reports that the final deal if it takes place will be at the lower end of the range. The aircraft was transferred at some point into to he hands of the now bankrupt Ayaks Cargo Airlines and the leased by Aeroflot. According to reports in Air Cargo News, before stopping at Maastricht, where it was delivering clothing to a Dutch wholesaler from Indonesia. The aircraft was reported to have had made some unrecorded stops in South East Asia and Bangladesh before finally delivering its cargo three weeks late for its Dutch customer. Even more speculatively the aircraft was reported to have arrived at Maastricht from S. Korea carrying a flight number normally associated with the Russian government airline Rossiya having over flown Russia.

Article ID: 1979