ISLAMABAD (December 30 2006): The Privatisation Commission has made the OGDC shares' secondary offering to the domestic investors. The subscription for 21,505,000 shares of the offer at Rs 110 per share will commence on January 11, and close on January 13, 2007.

The retail offer price represents an effective discount of almost 3 percent to the price paid by institutional investors in the international and domestic institutional offering that priced on November 30, 2006. The balloting for subscription will take place on January 23, with final allocations announced thereafter.

According to Privatisation Commission's announcement, the banks authorities for the offer included Allied Bank Limited, MCB Bank Limited, Askari Commercial Bank Limited, National Bank of Pakistan Limited, Bank Al-Falah Limited, PICIC Commercial Bank Limited, Bank Al-Habib Limited, Standard Chartered Bank, Faysal Bank Limited, The Bank of Punjab Limited, Habib Bank Limited and United Bank Limited.

Privatisation Minister Zahid Hamid said the offer was an important milestone in the government's 'privatisation for the people' program and represented an opportunity for Pakistanis to participate in the future growth of one of the country's flagship enterprises.

He said that OGDC has the largest oil and gas reserves and exploration acreage in Pakistan and with its planned expansion in exploration and production activities, is well poised to benefit from the increasing demand for energy, arising out of country's rapid economic growth and forward march towards progress and development.

The offer will be open to companies, bodies corporate or other legal entities incorporated or established in Pakistan (to the extent permitted by their constitutive documents and existing regulations as the case may be); provident/pension/gratuity funds/trusts (subject to the terms of their trust deed and existing regulations); branches in Pakistan of companies and bodies corporate incorporated outside Pakistan.

Copyright Business Recorder, 2006