Altimo to Buy 1.4% Voting Stake in VimpelCom for $256 Mln

MOSCOW, Mar 7 (Prime-Tass) -- Russia's Altimo has agreed to buy from Deutsche Bank 1.4% of voting shares in mobile operator VimpelCom for US$256.364 million, Altimo said Wednesday.

Altimo said it would buy 803,975 VimpelCom common shares in five deals before March 14.

After the acquisition, Altimo's voting stake in Russia's second biggest mobile company will rise to 37.7% from the current 36.3%.

Norway's Telenor currently holds 26.6% of VimpelCom?s voting shares.

VimpelCom's charter capital is split into 51.281 million common shares and 6.427 million preferred shares. Both types of shares have voting rights. All preferred shares are owned by Altimo.

Altimo is the telecommunications arm of Russian holding Alfa Group.

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Posted to the site on 7th March 2007