The multinational Swiss energy trader Gunvor announced on Thursday that it is withdrawing its offer to purchase Lukoil’s foreign assets after the U.S. Department of the Treasury signaled its intention to deny it a business license.
Last week, the Russian oil giant Lukoil announced that it had accepted Gunvor’s offer for foreign assets it decided to sell due to U.S. sanctions, with experts estimating that the sale price could be around nine billion dollars.
The conclusion of a binding agreement for the transaction was conditional on Gunvor obtaining a license from the U.S. Department of the Treasury, as well as from authorities in other jurisdictions, the Russian company emphasized at that time.
On Thursday, however, Gunvor withdrew its offer after being labeled a Russian ‘puppet’ by the U.S. Department of the Treasury, signaling that Washington opposes the transaction.
The U.S. Department of the Treasury announced on the social media platform X that President Donald Trump made it clear that the war in Ukraine must be ended immediately.
– As long as (Russian President Vladimir) Putin continues his unreasonable bloodshed, the Kremlin’s puppet, Gunvor, will never receive a license to operate and profit – stated the department’s announcement.
The Swiss company responded with a post on X stating that it ‘withdraws its offer to purchase Lukoil’s foreign assets’.
The statement from the U.S. Department of the Treasury ‘is fundamentally based on inaccurate information and does not reflect the facts’, Reuters quoted from an email by Gunvor’s Director of Corporate Affairs Seth Pietras.
