The main power utility PPC, on the front foot for solutions concerning its major-scale debtors, is preparing to issue a payment order to Halyvourgiki for a debt amount of 32 million euros after having already condemned the steel producer for breaching its agreement with the electricity corporation.
State-controlled PPC has ceased representing Halyvourgiki as an electricity supplier and, just weeks ago, criticized the industrial enterprise for having continued to benefit from lower-cost tariffs reserved for steel producers despite not having produced steel and related products since 2015.
PPC claims the Halyvourgiki company owner, the Aggelopoulos family, has, for years, leased the enterprise’s steel production plant, in Elefsina, west of Athens, to a third party for gas liquefaction purposes.
On another major debt front, PPC is believed to be close to reaching a payback program agreement with ELFE (Hellenic Fertilizers and Chemicals) for a debt amount of around 15 million euros.
In the lead-up, PPC was reinforced by a favorable court decision enabling the power utility to disrupt its electricity supply to ELFE, which drew the fertilizer and chemicals producer to the negotiating table with proposals.
A PPC-ELFE agreement would end an unusual payback method enforced on PPC by a Kavala court in August, 2017. The verdict issued by the court in northern Greece required PPC to keep supplying electricity to troubled ELFE and receive payments through one of a number of associated enterprises established by ELFE’s owner, the Lavrentis corporate group, headed by Lavrentis Lavrentiadis, a failed businessman who acquired ELFE in 2009.
Elsewhere, a debt agreement between PPC and state-controlled nickel producer Larco, a huge problem for the power utility, has yet to be found. A new payback program for a Larco debt amount of approximately 90 million euros accumulated since the most recent – yet ultimately unsuccessful – payback program established between the two sides is pending. Larco now owes PPC over 300 million euros in total.
Larco recently agreed to cut output by 20 percent. PPC holds an 11.45 percent stake in Larco, TAIPED, the state privatization fund, controls 55.19 percent, and the National Bank of Greece has a 33.36 percent stake.
Besides clamping down on major debtors, PPC is working on an industrial tariffs study demanded by the country’s privatization fund. It will aim to both maintain discounts and also introduce certain hikes, PPC’s chief executive informed yesterday without elaborating.