The Minister of Economy, Virgil Popescu, said on Tuesday, in Găeşti, Dâmboviţa County, that one of the scenarios considered for saving the Special Steel Plant (COS) Târgovişte is the conversion of debts into shares.
“COS Târgovişte is, from our point of view, a factory of national interest. We have evaluated several scenarios, one is the conversion of debts into shares, if this scenario is feasible, we will do it. Another scenario is that functional assets and those assets that are really functional and can contribute to a future company to be extracted from there on account of the debt and together with Fortus Iaşi, for example, where we have a somewhat similar situation, to make a company owned by the Romanian state. COS Târgovişte is very important to us and we will fight to achieve this. It is not easy, many strange things have happened at COS Târgovişte, but we are fighting to get it through”, stated Minister Virgil Popescu, quoted by Agerpres.
Prime Minister Orban also said that there are solutions that the Government has under analysis.
“I had discussions about COS Târgovişte, I also met with the representatives of the unions. There are several solutions that we have under analysis”, specified Ludovic Orban.
The management of COS Târgovişte announced the collective dismissal of the plant’s employees, motivating the suspension of the activity, the damages caused by the COVID-19 pandemic and the general situation of the insolvent plant.
The Valahia Târgovişte union specified in July that it had received a notification from the COS Târgovişte management that the production would end indefinitely and approximately 1,200 collective lay-offs would be operated.
“The date from which these dismissals will be made is not specified,” the Valahia Targoviste union said.
The Valahia union also announced that it presented to the parliamentarians of Dâmboviţa the existing situation at COS Târgovişte and asked for their support for the Romanian state to convert its debt claim at COS Târgovişte, of about 10 million euro, into shares. Throughout 2020, the company had ceased production.