Six foreign investors intend to buy PTBA shares

Six foreign and three local investors have expressed interest to buy shares of state coal company PT Batubara Bukit Asam (PTBA) which are planned to be sold through initial public offering (IPO) in mid-December, Bisnis Indonesia daily reported on Monday.

The foreign investors are AIG Investment from Singapore, Phaim Asset Management (Singapore), Indocam Asset Mangement (Hongkong), Fidelity Investment (Hongkong), Tenaga Nasional Bhd (TNB) (Malaysia) and Kideco Jaya Agung (Korea), the newspaper quoted a source as saying.

Meanwhile, the three local investors are Taspen, Dana Pensiun Perkebunan and Schroder Investment Management.

The source said that foreign investors expressed their interest to purchase PTBA shares in its road show in Singapore, Hongkong, Thailand and Malaysia recently.

Fidelity is the world?s fund manager giant which managed assets of US$800 billion by Sept 30, 2002, the source said.

The source could not estimate the total portion of PTBA assets which might be purchased by the nine investors.

The government decided late in October to sell 15 percent stake in PTBA this month through IPO on the Jakarta Stock Exchange and Surabaya Stock Exchange.

Earlier reported that PTBA had also planned to sell 20 percent of its shares through the Canadian Stock Exchange in the second semester of 2003.

PTBA operates coal mines in South Sumatra and west Sumatra which produced 10.2 million tons of coal in 2001, combined. The company?s total production was targeted at 9.8 million tons in 2002. (*)