Graham Stack in Kyiv -

Power holding DTEK won a tender for 50% of shares in Ukraine's largest energy-supply company Dniprooblenerho for UAH660.1m ($82m) on April 17. The deal sees Ukraine's richest man, Rinat Akhmetov, gain control over another asset to help push his hold over the country's coal and thermal energy production to around 50%.

The winning bid was fractionally over the starting price of UAH 600m, but sufficed to beat DTEK's opponent, oligarch Konstantin Grigorishin's Lugansk Energy Association, which refused to up its bid by another UAH6m increment despite having bothered to get out of bed to turn up. The final price is around 16% below the current market price, according to analysts.

The state will retain a 25% stake in the company, whilst a Cyprus-based company believed to be controlled by Akhmetov owns another 15.9%. The remaining shares are distributed among individuals (0.7%) and corporate entities. "For the past few years, the company has been run by managers with close ties to the holding (DTEK)," writes Art Capital analyst Stanislav Zelenetskiy.

Akhmetov's DTEK has won a string of low-cost privatization tenders that take his share of Ukraine's coal and thermal energy production to around 50%. The businessman was considered the main backer of President Viktor Yanukovych's campaign in 2010, although rivals for influence within the administration have since emerged.