Ukrainian mining and steel producing group Metinvest has announced that it has acquired an additional stake in the largest coking coal company in Ukraine, increasing its effective interest to a controlling stake. As a result of consolidating, the company may become fully self-sufficient in coking coal supply for its hot metal production.
Accordingly, following Metinvest’s acquisition of 24.77 percent of shares in Pokrovske coal business in July 2018, as well as an option to purchase the remaining 75.22 percent of shares from the other co-investors and after all required governmental and other approvals have been obtained, in October 2020 Metinvest received a one-year approval from the Antimonopoly Committee of Ukraine to obtain control over certain entities which are part of the Pokrovske coal business. The most significant entities are Pokrovske Colliery and Svyato-Varvarinskaya Enrichment Factory, which mine raw coal, enrich it and sell coking coal concentrate. The assets are located on the border of the Dnipro and Donetsk regions of Ukraine, with none of them being located in the non-controlled territories of Ukraine.
Pokrovske Colliery produces mostly high-quality K-grade coking coal, which is used in metallurgical coke production. As of January 1, 2019, its JORC mineral resources and reserves amounted to 248 million mt and 151 million mt, respectively, sufficient for at least 30 year-long production. Meanwhile, Svyato-Varvarinskaya Enrichment Factory is one of the largest beneficiation plants in Ukraine. Its annual designed processing capacity is around 8 million mt of raw coking coal. In 2020, Pokrovske coal business mined 6.2 million mt of raw coal, up 55 percent compared to the level achieved in 2018, and produced 3.2 million mt of coking coal concentrate, up 39 percent in the same period.