PPF Investments wins injunction over Ingosstrakh

...Investments said on Monday.

PPF Investments, a Czech private equity group, has been locked in a battle with Russia's Basic Element, the majority shareholder of Ingosstrakh, over PPF's influence in the firm.

The dispute follows a general meeting of Ingosstrakh shareholders on Oct. 8 when Basic Element voted to quadruple the firm's registered capital to 10 billion roubles through a closed issue of shares.

The share issue threatens to dilute PPF's stake in the insurance company from 38.5 percent to less than 10 percent.

"The Arbitrary Court in Moscow has ruled in favour of the plaintiffs issuing the preliminary action, which forbids the Russian federal service for financial markets to approve and to register the additional shares emission of Ingosstrakh until the whole case is debated and the final verdict is passed," PPF Investments said in a statement.

PPF Investments said on Sunday it was ready to talk to Basic Element, an industrial holding company controlled by Russian billionaire Oleg Deripaska, to settle the dispute.

PPF Investments says it was not invited to vote on the capital increase, which could never have been approved if it had voted.

PPF Investments' owners include Czech billionaire Petr Kellner, but the firm is run separately from Kellner's PPF Group, active in insurance and consumer lending in central Europe and Russia.

PPF Investments has said Italian insurer Generali , which runs its central European business together with the PPF Group, may become a shareholder in PPF Investments' Russian assets. (Reporting by Jan Lopatka; Editing by Greg Mahlich)

Keywords: INGOSSTRAKH PPFINVESTMENTS/DISPUTE

[PRAGUE/Reuters/Finance.cz]