Such was the expert's comment on Yukos filing a petition with a US Southern District Bankruptcy Court (Houston) on voluntary reorganization under the US Bankruptcy Code.
"I guess, it was a reasonable thing to do for the management, though I've got no idea what it would result in. Particularly, I am not sure that this will be enough to torpedo the first auction. The rest of the Yukos assets may found themselves in the state of bankruptcy, because foreign and domestic court rulings may collide," Mr. Shokhin believes.
According to Mr. Shokhin, US managers of Yukos, Steven Theede and Bruce Misamore, are apprehensive of finding themselves in the dock and "getting blacklisted in the West for their failure to protect the interests of the company", if the company is "ruined" and its shareholders and creditors secure their investments.
"Secondly, they [Mr. Theede and Mr. Misamore] will sure to try and have the assets' sale postponed and soft-pedal the issue into bankruptcy instead," Mr. Shokhin said.
He underlined that "bankruptcy allows all those concerned to expect some sort of compensation."
In Mr. Shokhin's opinion, the auctioning of Yuganskneftegaz had been announced before Yukos filed its petition with the bankruptcy court in Houston and "will, possibly, be carried through."
According to a recent Yukos press release, the company's petition lodged with the US Bankruptcy Court in Houston in particular requests the court to issue a ruling to suspend the Yuganskneftegaz auction scheduled for December 19. According to the press release, the company would like the court ruling to protect the interests of all of its shareholders.
