Istanbul gas grid may be privatized through public offering rather than bloc sale: Mayor

ANKARA - Reuters

Istanbul’s gas grid İGDAŞ may be privatized through an initial public offering rather than through a bloc sale method, Istanbul Metropolitan Municipality Mayor Kadir Topbaş has said, adding that the authorities would like to sell the grid to city locals.

Topbaş told NTV that the municipality has been working on the privatization of İGDAŞ, which consumes around 50 percent of the country’s natural gas supply, adding that many local and global companies had shown an interest in acquiring İGDAŞ. 

“We had actually made preparations for a bloc sale, but we have changed our idea and decided to publicly offer our company after an assessment period,” he said, adding that this decision was supported President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan and Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoğlu. 

He noted that the municipality might see some financial losses in the event of a public offering of İGDAŞ. 

“We have taken this risk so as to enable our people to acquire İGDAŞ. We have been in a preparation process. We’ll publicly offer our company very soon. As İGDAŞ is an asset of Istanbul, Istanbulite subscribers will be preferred at the first stage as potential buyers,” Topbaş said. 

The İGDAŞ network serves more than 5.6 million customers in Turkey’s largest city and sold 5 billion cubic meters of gas last year, generating 4.6 billion Turkish Liras of revenue and a 279 million-lira net profit, according to its annual report. 

Turkey’s total gas consumption this year is expected to be around 48 billion to 49 billion cubic meters.