February 13 (SeeNews) - Bulgaria's competition regulator has said it granted its approval to Swiss-based EuroChem Trading to acquire fertiliser distributor Agricola Bulgaria.
Since Agricola Bulgaria holds a 5-10% share of the Bulgarian market, and Eurochem Trading's is below 5%, the deal won't lead to the establishment or expansion of a dominant market position, the Commission for Protection of Competition said in a statement on Friday.
You can subscribe to our M&A newsletter here
Agricola Bulgaria is a wholly owned subsidiary of Brussels-based fertiliser distributor Agrium Europe, with a registered share capital of 2 million levs ($1.1 million/1 million euro). The company is based in the town of Pleven, in northern Bulgaria, and produces roughly 70,000-80,000 tonnes of fertilisers per year.
EuroChem is a vertically integrated agrochemical company, with production bases in Belgium, China, Kazakhstan, Lithuania and Russia, combined with wholly-owned logistics assets covering more than 25 countries.
(1 euro = 1.95583 levs)