Greece to bring privatization plan to China

[amoy]

Greece to bring privatization plan to China|Business|chinadaily.com.cn

The Greek government is taking to China its plan to raise 50 billion euros ($64.74 billion) by privatizing some of its assets in a bid to attract "long-term investors", a Greek diplomat said on Thursday.

His remarks came amid widespread doubts concerning the government's ability to follow through with the plan, which may further postpone aid from coming to the country.

A group of high-ranking Greek officials will visit Shanghai on Nov 30 as part of a road show to promote the sale of the Greek assets, aiming to "dissipate negative impressions by presenting the true economic potential of Greece", said Evgenios Kalpyris, consul general of Greece in Shanghai.

The event will serve as an important opportunity for Chinese businessmen to receive "authoritative and updated information on investment opportunities in Greece, showcasing it as a truly attractive investment destination armed with a friendly legal framework", he said.

Kalpyris said the privatization plan should not be thought of as a potential source of cash to fill the holes in the budget. His government is instead looking for people who have the capital and who will be eager to help the Greek economy and make a profit along the way.

Greece's sale of gaming stake is part of privatization -- Shanghai Daily | 上海日报 -- English Window to China New

GREECE will sell almost all of its stake in gambling monopoly OPAP, the government said yesterday, raising the amount that is for sale in a bid to convince foreign lenders that it is serious about selling off state assets.

Athens, which owns 34 percent of one of Europe's biggest gaming companies, has launched a tender to sell a 33 percent stake in the company, the privatization agency HRADF said. Previously Greece had planned to sell 29 percent of OPAP, currently worth about 450 million euros (US$579 million) on the Athens bourse.

OPAP is central to Greece's plan to raise 19 billion euros from privatizations by 2015 - a key condition of its 130-billion euro bailout agreed earlier this year. It is the country's most profitable state firm with a sports betting monopoly stretching, for some games, as far as 2030.

 

[jalsa]

The Chinese will own the Greeks soon.

 

[amoy]

China 'set to invest billions in debt-stricken Greece' - Telegraph

The strategic location of Greece's abundant port facilities make it a gateway for China into the Balkans and Europe.

Cosco, the Chinese shipping giant, last year signed a 35-year lease with Greece to expand the two main container terminals at the main Greek port of Piraeus for a guaranteed premium of €3.4bn.

It assumed full control of the major container dock last week.

"We have a saying in China, 'construct the eagle's nest and the eagle himself will come'," Wei Jiafu, Cosco chief executive, said in a Greek television interview last week. "We have constructed such a nest in [Greece] to attact such Chinese eagles. This is our contribution to you."

In May, Dimitris Reppas, the Greek transport minister, said that Chinese companies had shown interest in the privatisation of Greece's heavily indebted railway OSE.