Iranian state-run firms cede $3.9 billion worth of shares

TEHRAN,March 15(MNA)- Over 7 billion shares of state-run companies, worth some 48 trillion rials (around $3.9 billion) were transferred to the private sector since the beginning of the current calendar year (March 21, 2011). Some 118 trillion rials (around $10 billion) of the Iranian government’s equities will be transferred to domestic banks on the stock market through holding tenders, the deputy director of the Iranian Privatization Organization announced on March 6. Abolqasem Shamsi Jamkhaneh told Fars news agency that the shares of state-run entities will be divested by the end of the first half of the next calendar year (September 22). Iran has privatized up to 500 companies during the last six years, said Iran’s minister of economic affairs and finance in August 2011. Shamseddin Hosseini announced that the government has gained around 77 billion dollars income by ceding shares of the companies to the private sector during the mentioned period.