 | |
| Company type | Sociedad Anónima |
|---|---|
| BCBA: COME MERVAL component | |
| Industry | |
| Founded | 1927 |
| Headquarters | Buenos Aires, Argentina |
Key people | Ignacio Noel (Chairman) Pablo Arnaude (Director) Matías Brea (Director) |
| Services | |
| Revenue |  US$ 185.2 million (2012) [1] |
| US$185.8 million (2012) | |
Number of employees | 2,500 |
| Subsidiaries |
|
| Website | scp.com.ar |
Sociedad Comercial del Plata is a diversified Argentine holding company, with interests primarily in the energy, rail transport, real estate, and tourism sectors.
Sociedad Comercial del Plata was founded in Buenos Aires on June 7, 1927, [2] and became a holding company with varied interests, primarily real estate. [3] Francisco Soldati (a nephew of José Francisco Soldati, the owner of the city's largest utility, the Italian-Argentine Electric Company, and founder of the Villa Lugano ward of Buenos Aires) [4] bought controlling interest in SCP in 1965, and expanded the company into petroleum transport; he ultimately lost his life in a November 1979 bombing carried out by the far-left Montoneros terrorist group, in one of their last attacks. [5]
His son, Francisco, became President of SCP in 1976. SCP remained focused on its fuel and electricity, and established a realty, Del Plata Propiedades, though the group's growth was hampered by the debt and inflation crisis in the local economy during the 1980s. The younger Francisco Soldati died in a polo accident in April 1991. [5]
His younger brother, Santiago Soldati, took control of SCP at a time when Argentine President Carlos Menem and Economy Minister Domingo Cavallo were advancing an ambitious privatizations policy. SCP became a minority shareholder in newly privatized television, telephone, natural gas, electricity, freight rail services, as well as the metro Buenos Aires water utility. These became Telefé, Telefónica de Argentina, Transportadora de Gas del Norte, Transener, Ferroexpreso Pampeano and Aguas Argentinas, respectively, during the early 1990s. SCP also gained control of water utilities in Córdoba, La Plata, and Santa Fe. [6]
Soldati invested part of SCP's earnings into two tourist attractions: the Tren de la Costa railway, and the Parque de la Costa amusement park. The first was developed by securing a concession in 1993 to operate the formerly state-owned Ferrocarril Central Argentino route between the northern Buenos Aires suburbs of Olivos and Tigre, in disuse since 1961. Following the recovery of derelict rails and stations, and the purchase of new equipment, the 16 km (10 mi) "Coastal Train" was inaugurated in April 1995, helping revive the largely upscale area's real estate market. [7]
As the largest shareholder in Aguas Argentinas (with 20 percent), SCP profited by Soldati's decision in 1998 to sell its stake to Paris-based Suez, which paid SCP US$150 million for its shares, or three times what Soldati's company had paid in 1993. [8] The sale of the profitable unit was partly motivated by growing debts at SCP, however, whose revenue forecast was dampened by the local effects during 1995-96 of the Mexican peso crisis. Its US$715 million debt was nearly double its book value, and in 1997, SCP divested itself of the natural gas processing concerns had under its Compañía General de Combustibles (CGC) unit for US$230 million, most of which had to be earmarked for debt retirement. [3]
Controlling CPC, the nation's second-largest construction company, Soldati shed a half ownership stake in the builder, as well as 100% of the BAN gas company, by 1998. SCP, however, defaulted on a US$25 million debt in April 1999, which effectively shut it out of the corporate bond market. The principal drain on the group's finances had reportedly been its US$400 million investment in the two, suburban Buenos Aires tourist attractions: the Tren and Parque de la Costa. Though a majority stake in the latter was sold, their ongoing losses and service costs on their startup debt continued to stymy SCP's balance sheet. [9]
Negotiations with creditors followed, but a lawsuit filed against SCP by US-based Reef Exploration in 2000 over the sale of a subsidiary to Shell Petroleum led to Soldati's decision to file for SCP's bankruptcy in September of that year. [10] The sale of a number of energy related interests to Techint, the Argentine multinational registered in Luxembourg, could not rescue SCP from bankruptcy, and in 2004, Soldati divested it of 81% of its CGC unit, which was sold to local household chemicals maker The Value Brand. [11]
That year, SCP's bankruptcy was approved in court, which granted it an 80% discharge of a debt which had grown to US$1.2 billion, by then. [12] The discharge allowed SCP to enter into a modest venture with Millicom, a Luxembourg-based mobile phone network provider, [13] which resulted in Latin America's first WiMax network. [14]
SCP's legal problems continued, however, as the bankruptcy ruling had been appealed by a commercial court prosecutor in 2006, [15] and in October 2009, the Argentine Supreme Court struck down the earlier ruling, citing irregularities in the shareholders' meeting convened to approve the bankruptcy. [12]
Citing his having reached retirement age, Soldati stepped down as the President of SCP on December 31, 2009, and designated Ignacio Noel [16] as the new one. [17]
Transport in Argentina is mainly based on a complex network of routes, crossed by relatively inexpensive long-distance buses and by cargo trucks. The country also has a number of national and international airports. The importance of the long-distance train is minor today, though in the past it was widely used and is now regaining momentum after the re-nationalisation of the country's commuter and freight networks. Fluvial transport is mostly used for cargo.
Beccar is a town located 17 km (11 mi) north of the Buenos Aires metropolitan area in the Buenos Aires Province, Argentina. It is part of the partido of San Isidro in Gran Buenos Aires. It is situated close to the historic town of San Isidro and it is characterized by tree lined streets and plazas, red tiled roofed style chalets, high-rise apartment buildings that line the Avenida Centenario zone and by being close to the coast of Rio de la Plata river and yacht clubs. Nearby there is a large shanty town (Villa La Cava). Beccar is served by a 10-minute walk to scenic Tren de la Costa light rail line at Punta Chica station and the commuter railway at Beccar station with easy access to Buenos Aires city centre and the weekend retreat of the Village of Tigre.
The Unidad Ejecutora del Plan Ferroviario Provincial (UEPFP) (in English: "Executive Unit of the Provincial Railway Plan"), mostly known under its trade name Ferrobaires, was a public railway company which operated extensive long-distance passenger trains throughout the Buenos Aires Province in Argentina. The company was primarily owned and funded by the Buenos Aires provincial government led by Eduardo Duhalde. The name "Ferrobaires" is a combination of the Spanish words for "Rail Buenos Aires."
Tren de la Costa is a suburban 15.5 km (9.6 mi), 11-station light rail line in Greater Buenos Aires, between Maipú Avenue station in the northern suburb of Olivos and Delta station in Tigre, on the Río de la Plata. The line connects with the Mitre line at Maipú station, via a footbridge across Avenida Maipú, for direct access to Retiro terminus in central Buenos Aires.
The Buenos Aires–Rosario–Córdoba high-speed railway was a project designed to link the Argentine cities of Buenos Aires, Rosario and Córdoba through a 710 km (440 mi) high-speed rail network.
The General Bartolomé Mitre Railway (FCGBM), named after the former Argentine president Bartolomé Mitre, is one of the six state-owned Argentine railway lines formed after President Juan Perón's nationalisation of the railway network in 1948 and one of the largest of Argentina. The six divisions, managed by Ferrocarriles Argentinos were later broken up during the process of railway privatisation beginning in 1991 during Carlos Menem's presidency.
Villa Lugano is a barrio (neighbourhood) in Buenos Aires, Argentina, located in the south of the city. It has a population of approximately 114,000 people. It is delimited by Avenida Eva Perón, Avenida General Paz, Calle José Barros Pazos, Avenida Lisandro de la Torre, Avenida Coronel Roca and Avenida Escalada. To the south-east it limits with La Matanza Partido.
Ferroexpreso Pampeano S.A. is an Argentine private railway company that operates freight services over a 5,094 km (3,165 mi) 5 ft 6 in network that comprises broad gauge Sarmiento Railway and the Rosario and Puerto Belgrano section of Roca Railway.
The Mitre line is an Argentine broad gauge commuter rail service in Buenos Aires Province and is part of the Ferrocarril General Bartolomé Mitre division. The service is currently operated by the State-owned company Operadora Ferroviaria Sociedad del Estado after the Government of Argentina rescinded its contract with Corredores Ferroviarios in March 2015.
The San Martín line is a 70-kilometre (43 mi), 22-station commuter rail service in the metropolitan area of Buenos Aires, Argentina. The San Martín line operates from the city-centre terminus of Retiro north-west to Doctor Cabred in Luján Partido along a broad gauge line built by the British-owned Buenos Aires and Pacific Railway.
The Roca line is a 1,676 mm gauge commuter rail service in the Buenos Aires Province, Argentina, part of General Roca Railway network. The service is currently operated by State-owned company Trenes Argentinos, from the city-centre terminus of Constitución south to Ezeiza, Alejandro Korn, La Plata, Cañuelas, Chascomús, Gutiérrez and Lobos, and west to Sarmiento Line's station Haedo. The transfer stations between the branch lines are Avellaneda, Temperley, Bosques and Berazategui.
The Argentine railway network consisted of a 47,000 km (29,204 mi) network at the end of the Second World War and was, in its time, one of the most extensive and prosperous in the world. However, with the increase in highway construction, there followed a sharp decline in railway profitability, leading to the break-up in 1993 of Ferrocarriles Argentinos (FA), the state railroad corporation. During the period following privatisation, private and provincial railway companies were created and resurrected some of the major passenger routes that FA once operated.
Amado Boudou is an Argentine economist and politician who served as the Vice President of Argentina from 2011 to 2015. He previously served as Minister of Economy from 2009 to 2011.
Santiago Soldati is a prominent Argentine businessman.
David Graiver was an Argentine businessman and banker who was investigated in the 1970s for alleged money laundering of US$17 million for the Montoneros, a leftist guerrilla group. He was indicted for embezzlement after his reported death by Manhattan District Attorney Robert Morgenthau, who had thought he might have faked his death, because of the September 15, 1976, failure of American Bank & Trust. This was the fourth-largest bank failure in United States history at the time, and Graiver's banks in Argentina and elsewhere also failed. A New York court declared Graiver officially dead on January 15, 1979, clearing the way for resolution of some outstanding financial issues.
Parque de la Costa is an amusement park located in Tigre, a northern suburb of Buenos Aires, Argentina.
Operadora Ferroviaria Sociedad del Estado (SOFSE), trading as Trenes Argentinos Operaciones, is an Argentine state-owned company created in 2008 to operate passenger services in Argentina. It operates as a division of Ferrocarriles Argentinos S.E..
Corredores Ferroviarios was an Argentine private company that operated the Mitre and San Martín railway services in Buenos Aires Province for about one year until the Government of Argentina rescinded the agreement with the company in March 2015. Since then, the Mitre and San Martín line are operated by State-owned company Operadora Ferroviaria Sociedad del Estado (SOFSE).
Mar del Plata is a railway and bus terminus in the homonymous city of Buenos Aires Province, Argentina. Opened in 2009 as a bus terminus only, the railway tracks from the old "Norte" station were extended to connect both terminals in 2011 by architect Claudio Luis Lucarelli, adding new platforms to receive trains from Buenos Aires.
Santa Fe is a railway station located in the city of Santa Fe, Argentina in the province of the same name, Argentina. The station is no longer used for railway services since 2007, when defunct company Trenes de Buenos Aires cancelled its services to Santa Fe.
|
