Batistas OSX presents

restructuring plan
By Samantha Pearson in So PauloAuthor alerts
Reuters
Batista, CEO of EBX Group, gestures to the audience during a ceremony in celebration of the start of oil production of
OGX in Rio de Janeiro
Eike Batistas bankrupt shipbuilder, OSX, has presented its long-awaited
restructuring plan, seeking approval to pay back its $2.6bn of debt over 25 years.
Under the proposal, Brazils former richest man plans to ensure the companys
survival by leasing the areas OSX owns in the vast Au Port complex in Rio de
Janeiro. It may also seek to raise additional funds, possibly through the sale of stakes
in the company, OSX said in the plan it presented to a Rio court late on Friday.

The shipbuilder was forced to file for bankruptcy in November last year, just over a
week after Mr Batistas oil company and its main customer requested judicial
recovery after its only producing wells proved to duds.
If the plan is approved, OSX will only start paying off the bulk of its debts after three
years. In the meantime, it will divide R$25,000 among all creditors within a year of
the plans approval. It will pay another R$80,000 within a year to creditors of its
subsidiary OSX Construo Naval.
The objective of the plan is to allow OSX to overcome its economic-financial crisis,
to implement the available measures of operational reorganisation to serve the
interests and preserve the rights of its creditors and shareholders, the company said.
For the first time, the company also gave a full account of the events that led to the
collapse of OSX and leo e Gs Participaes, Mr Batistas oil company formerly
known as OGX, putting some blame on the risky nature of the sector itself.
OSX faces the direct consequences of the occurrence of a series of adverse facts
related to the risks of the activity that it is involved in, some of which were foreseen
in the prospectus for the initial public offering of OSX, it said.
The businesses developed by OSX depend significantly on the level of activity of the
oil and gas sector in Brazil, particularly the willingness of oil and gas companies to
invest in offshore exploration, development and production, it said.
However, many investors blame Mr Batista himself for the groups downfall. The
entrepreneur, who once ranked as the worlds seventh-richest individual, is being
investigated by Brazils market regulators over insider trading claims.
Regulators at CVM, Brazils version of the US SEC, claim the tycoon hid problems at
his oil company from investors for 10 months and used Twitter to manipulate the
companys share price. Mr Batista has denied the allegations.
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