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NEWS
Gold says reports of Norilsk arrest are untrue
May 3, 2004
By Sherilee Bridge
Johannesburg - Gold Fields, the world's fourth-largest gold producer, confirmed at the weekend that the controlling shareholder of its newest shareholder, Norilsk Nickel, had not been arrested.
Andrew Davidson, a spokesperson for Gold Fields, said on Friday that the company had been in contact with Russia and was confident that reports that Vladimir Potanin, the head of Norilsk Nickel's parent company Interros Holding, had been arrested were untrue.
The rumours were that Potanin had been arrested in connection with Norilsk's $1.16 billion (R8 billion) acquisition of Anglo American's 20 percent stake in Gold Fields.
According to news agency Bloomberg, no warrant had been put out for Potanin's arrest, and Gold Fields was unable to confirm whether the Russian tycoon had been called in for questioning. While unconfirmed, the rumours of the arrest shaved $2 billion off the market capitalisation of Norilsk since Wednesday.
Gold Fields stock climbed on Wednesday but then slid sharply in the last two days of the week to close at R70.25 on Friday, in line with the gold mining sector's 0.61 percent decline.
This led Russian market analysts to believe that the rumours were manufactured to benefit speculators.
Traders quoted by Russia's Kommersant newspaper said the story of Potanin's arrest had been circulating for a few days.
According to the news report, it was spread by "one large investment company, which called its clients to tell them that Potanin had been summoned to the prosecutor-general's office".
Both the company and the prosecutor-general's office denied the questioning.
Potanin left Russia for Israel on what his company said was a scheduled business trip.