The Bulgarian defence ministry will put up for sale this fall some 240 properties around the country as it attempts to shed redundant assets, defence minister Nikolai Tsonev said on Wednesday.

The listings will include land plots, buildings, shops, warehouses and community centers in Sofia, Plovdiv, Varna, Burgas and several local resorts.

The properties that will be listed for sale are part of the 713 defence ministry properties classified as redundant.

The disposal method will depend on the location of the land plots earmarked for privatisation. Some will be sold. Others will be developed by the ministry itself. A third option is to sell the building rights but retain ownership of the land.

Going forward, the property disposals will be handled by a newly created department, the military infrastructure, asset management and investment directorate general.

The sale proceeds will be invested in the modernisation of the armed forces and the purchase of personnel housing.(Dnevnik)

Trace Group and Holding Patishta are the only Bulgarian contractors in position to meet the tough qualification criteria for the selection of a builder to finish the Nova Zagora-Yambol stretch of the Trakia motorway, it transpired after a statement in this sense from Ivan Boikov, executive director of the chamber of building contractors.

Boiko did not rule out the possibility that the contract may be contested by a consortium of Bulgarian companies.

The tender notice has been sent by the Bulgarian road agency to the EU's Tenders Daily, reported the Stroitelstvo i Gradat newspaper.

The newspaper said the motorway section will have three overpasses and three underpasses.

The candidates for the contract should have built, rehabilitated or reconstructed at least one road or airport runway facility at a cost of over 30 mln levs. They are also required to certify at least 200 mln levs in construction and assembly works over the last three years.

Boikov said the chamber successfully negotiated with the road agency to lower the bar which was originally supposed to be at two facilities worth 30 ml levs each and a total of 300 mln levs in construction works for the past three years.

The candidates should operate an asphalt factory with an hourly output capacity of 160 tons no further than 80 km from the tendered facility.

The bid deadline is October 2.

The government recently decided to use 100 mln levs from the nation's structural reserve for the construction of the Trakia motorway.

A Portuguese-led consortium was originally awarded the concession contract for the motorway but the deal was cancelled after it failed to raise the necessary funding.

There are no updated estimates for the cost of the motorway section. The cancelled concession contract stated a price of 2.7 mln euro/km but the price of fuels and asphalt have more than doubled since that estimate was made.(Dnevnik)

The bonds secured with key assets of debt-ridden Bulgarian steel maker Kremikovtzi have slumped to new lows and now trade at less than 30% of par, financiers told Dnevnik.

The decline in value was prompted by the failure of the issuer, Kremikovtzi unit Bulgaria Steel Finance, and of the guarantor, Kremikovtzi itself, to meet interest payments, making payable immediately principal and interest payable under the notes or around 335 mln euro.

The Kremikovtzi bonds are traded off-screen with daily volumes between 1 mln and 2 mln euro. Some of the bonds traded at low as 26% of par on Wednesday.

Earlier, Dnevnik report that a UK court in May ruled that the bonds had become callable after the event of default following non-payment of a 19.5 mln euro coupon.

It also transpired that the recent insolvency ruling against Kremikovtzi handed down by the Sofia city court did not take into account the callability of the notes because no evidence to this end was presented to the judges.

The Bulgarian court said it had not way of verifying the unsigned translations that were presented and said the panel of judges was not competent to determine the grounds for callability before the notes became due.

Since the ruling names December 31, 2005 as the date of insolvency, the claims of the holders of bonds secured with assets of the steel maker that were issued after said date may turn out to be worthless. Bondholders have threatened lawsuits if their interested are not protected during the insolvency procedure.

The bondholders are ready to take charge of the plant and hire an international consulting agency to run it while they look for a strategic investor to take it off their hands.

(Dnevnik)

The Bulgarian property market is treading water with holiday homes emerging as the riskiest segment, local real estate investment fund managers said on Wednesday.

The ongoing fragmentation of the market will be short-lived and it should regain its brisk growth momentum within the next couple of years, said Todor Stoyanov and Petar Syarov, the second executive director and the investor relations officer of local real estate investment trust Prime Property BG.

The holiday homes segment had been on the back foot but demand is once again picking up over the last two months, said Stoyanov.

Ski resort Bansko and sea resorts Sunny Beach and Sveti Vlas are the most risky property markets at the moment, said Stoyanov and Syarov.

Despite the market slowdown, fears that it may cause prices to plummet are ungrounded, said the experts.

According to the analysts of the company, the market is undergoing a gradual price reality-check, an indication that a bubble scenario has been averted.(Dnevnik)