Norilsk to probe ownership of Prokhorov mine assets

MOSCOW, July 25 (Reuters) - Russian miner Norilsk Nickel (GMKN.MM) will challenge an outgoing executive over ownership of several metals deposits he plans to take with him to a new company created by former Norilsk co-owner Mikhail Prokhorov.

Maxim Finsky, head of geology at Norilsk, is moving to the Intergeo company that Prokhorov launched on Thursday with the intention of spending $10 billion over the next five years developing copper, nickel, titanium and precious metals fields.

Some of the deposits unveiled by Intergeo, including the Iisk-Tagul field -- Russia's largest untapped nickel field -- were acquired by companies understood to be close to Norilsk during Finsky's tenure at the company.

They are all exploration and development projects and have no bearing on the company's current or short-term production.

Norilsk said on Friday it would carry out an investigation "to clarify the legal grounds on which the deposits acquired within the framework of projects run by Mr. Finsky when he served for Norilsk Nickel are mentioned as projects to be developed by Intergeo".

The probe does not concern all Intergeo assets.

Finsky, who still works for Norilsk, was not immediately available for comment.

Prokhorov's investment company, Onexim Group, said it plans to become a top-three global metals miner by developing deposits throughout Siberia and northwest Russia.

In a presentation released on Onexim's Internet blog, the group revealed its assets as including Iisk-Tagul -- a field it said contains over 9 million tonnes of nickel, 3.5 million tonnes of copper and 750 tonnes of platinum group metals. A company called East Sayany Nickel Co won an auction in March to develop the field in the Siberian region of Irkutsk, paying $30.4 million. Norilsk said at the time the company was representing its interests. "The licences have been acquired by subsidiaries of Norilsk. The question is: who owns the subsidiaries?," said a market analyst, who asked not to be named because of the sensitivity of the issue.

OTHER DEPOSITS

Prokhorov, ranked Russia's fifth-richest man by Forbes magazine, is an ex-chief executive of Norilsk. In April, he sold his one-quarter stake in the company to United Company RUSAL after splitting from fellow Norilsk co-owner, Vladimir Potanin.

Norilsk did not specify the assets it planned to investigate. Another field cited by Intergeo, the western flank of the Gremyakhi-Vyrmes titanium deposit, is understood by analysts to be under question.

In total, Intergeo says it holds copper reserves and resources in excess of 15 million tonnes, plus more than 9 million tonnes of nickel, 1 million tonnes of molybdenum, 750 tonnes of platinum group metals and 90 million tonnes of titanium. It did not say how these reserves were calculated. Intergeo is targeting annual copper production of 280,000 tonnes and 150,000 tonnes of nickel -- slightly more than half the amount produced last year by Norilsk, the world's largest nickel miner.

It also plans to produce 15,000 tonnes a year of molybdenum, 120,000 tonnes of titanium and over 17 tonnes (546,560 ounces) of gold. It did not give a time scale.

(Editing by Erica Billingham)