Russian conglomerate Sistema could miss out on about 15 billion roubles ($255 million) in dividends from subsidiaries this year because of a legal row, potentially limiting its scope for acquisitions, analysts said on Tuesday.
A Russian court froze part of Sistema's 50 percent stake in telecoms firm MTS and its holdings in two more subsidiaries on Monday as part of a legal dispute with state oil company Rosneft.
Bailiffs also said Sistema cannot receive any income from 31.76 percent of MTS, 90.47 percent of Bashkirian Power Grid company and any of its wholly-owned Medsi medical clinics chain.
Sistema said it plans to appeal against both the asset freeze and the ban on receiving dividend income. It also said the bailiff's restrictions on dividend income were not included in the court order freezing the assets.
VTB analysts estimated Sistema would only get about 8.5 billion roubles from MTS this year, down from 23 billion in 2016, and Raiffeisenbank put the overall dividend shortfall for Sistema at 15 billion roubles or more.
Sistema declined to comment on the estimates.
Bashkirian Power Grid has recommended a dividend for 2016 of 1.3 billion roubles. It was not immediately clear if Medsi, which lost 500 million roubles last year, was likely to send any cash upstream to Sistema.
"It would not hurt Sistema's ability to service its debt or fund its operational activity, but could restrict its freedom when it comes to mergers and acquisitions," said Raiffeisenbank analyst Sergey Libin.
Sistema said earlier this year that it was looking to boost its land bank as it expands in farming with a view to listing its agricultural business in the next few years.
Shares in Sistema slumped by as much as 17 percent early on Tuesday, after the asset freeze. Rosneft is suing Sistema for 170.6 billion roubles ($2.9 billion) in damages following its purchase of oil producer Bashneft last year. (Reporting by Maria Kiselyova and Anastasia Teterevleva; editing by David Clarke)