The involvement of the company Hellas Gold – subsidiary of EL Dorado Gold – in the gold mine project in Skouries Chalkidiki, Greece, resulted in not one, but two big losers. So far, all the attention has focused on stock losses recorded by the Canadian group of El Dorado Gold, as the share which it is trading in the market of Toronto (and in Wall Street) has lost 26.5% of its value since the beginning of the year. The plunge of the stock created a domino effect as it took its toll on the financial figures of the Greek group of Ellaktor, participator of Hellas Gold, where the business interests of Bobolas famiy are expressed. Indeed, the losses exhibited in the first quarter of this year by Ellaktor (12.3 million Euros) are almost entirely due to the decline of the El Dorado Gold stock. This is because the Greek group owns 1.1% of the Canadian company, while at the same time it also owns 5% of Hellas Gold that operates in Skouries. It is significant that at the end of 2004, the participation of Ellaktor in El Dorado Gold was valued at 77.342 million Euros. In the end, however, of last March, the value of this shareholding was forfeited to 64.97 million Euros, thus creating a financial hole of 12.372 million Euros in the financial data of Ellaktor for the first quarter of the year. It is evident, however, that the adventure for the Bobolas group does not end here, as the share of El Dorado is continuing its descent thus increasing the negative impact on the accounts of Ellaktor. This is because at this moment the participation value has gone down to 57.4 million Euros. That is, the Bobolas group has lost 7.6 million Euros more. The downfall for the stock market course of El Dorado came after the intervention of the Minister of Productive Reconstruction, Environment and Energy Mr. Lafazanis and the new government policy which was against the project of gold mining. At the beginning of this year, the stock of El Dorado was at 7.8 Canadian Dollars, while now it is at 5.20. At the same time, the market value of the Canadian company has decreased by 2 billion Euros.
DEAL NEWS, 19/06/2015
