Usmanov finds shareholder-wide response in Corus

Usmanov finds shareholder-wide response in Corus

According to the news from the industry, Russian investor of Corus is planning to re-appoint Dutch Adrianus Van der Velden, former Corus board member, to the board as a non-executive director at the annual meeting which is scheduled to take place this week. However, this irritated other shareholders of Corus and caused to call for counter deterrence to such an attempt by the second largest shareholder Alisher Usmanov, followed by Brandes Investment of the US with 15%. Russian investor which now holds 13.4% through his Cyprus-based Gallagher Holdings expresses that Dutch part of the firm is profitable, while British part is recording losses constantly since the merger in 1999. It is believed that increasing Dutch influence in the management through this re-appointment is aimed by Alisher Usmanov. There are contradictional statements that Usmanov intends to open up business relations between Corus and its own operations in Ural Mountains, Russia in order to supply raw materials such as iron ore to Corus. On the other hand, owing to the fact that there is an insatiable demand from Russia and China and transportation costs are pretty high, this idea is found irrational. Besides, in the market it is speculated that all or part of Corus' businesses in UK should be sold in case a material upturn is achieved in financial results. Last month Corus reported its fourth consecutive annual loss with £305 million. Nevertheless it can also be considered as an improvement as for the previous year same was reportedly £458 million. The narrowing loss may be attributed to almost 1'800 job cuts and pick up in steel prices worldwide.