In response to the world financial crisis, the first half of 2009 was dominated by a significant reduction of investment decisions, and privatisation advisors unanimously recommended that key projects should be put on hold until the market recovers. Minister Aleksander Grad stressed, however, that the Ministry of Treasury will continue its privatisation policy, although not at all costs, and only under the condition that the companies can be sold for a price corresponding to their actual value. The first half of 2009 brought PLN 488 million from privatisation proceeds (as of 30 June 2009).
 

Despite market volatility and a significant slowdown of world economies, Poland adopted a very balanced economic policy based, among other things, on the assumption that the privatisation is a better response to the crisis than nationalization or raising taxes. This approach resulted in a positive response of investors to the Ministry’s privatisation offer. One of the signs of the investor’s revived interest was the IPO of the coalmine Lubelski Węgiel „Bogdanka”, which brought PLN 528 million (the company debuted on the Warsaw Stock Exchange on 25 June 2009).

By the end of December 2009 a total of 105 privatisation agreements (including 14 concerning a free-of-charge transfer of shares to self-governments) which brought a total of gross PLN 6.97 billion (this amount includes the proceeds from the sale of the pre-emption rights of PKO BP S.A. for PLN 1.39 billion and the proceeds from UniCredit amounting to PLN 300 million obtained in connection with the option agreement for Pekao S.A. shares). By the end of the previous year a total of PLN 6.59 billion was entered into the books. This amount is almost 3 times larger than the one obtained in 2008 (PLN 2.371 billion), more than 3.5 times larger than in 2007 (PLN 1.947 billion) and more than 11 times larger than in 2006 (PLN 0.621 billion).
 

The good timing was confirmed, among other things, by sale transactions (on the Warsaw Stock Exchange) of the minority stakes held by the Treasury. In 2009, 16 stakes were sold for PLN 2.26 billion.Altogether, 61 minority stakes were sold, which has been the best result up to date. The public offerings of PKO S.A. and PGE Polska Grupa Energetyczna S.A also turned out to be successful. Within the interval of only two days (3-6 November 2009), PKO S.A. and PGE Polska Grupa Energetyczna S.A. generated from the stock exchange over PLN 11 billion (5,125,000,000.00 and 5,968,810,500.00 respectively). Combined with the debut (in June) of LW „Bogdanka”, the transactions brought PLN 11.53 billion.

Having acquired the certainty that none of the companies would become insolvent, the planned income from dividends for 2009 amounting to PLN 7.1 billion exceeded this amount, reaching PLN 7.84 billion, which means that the plans were accomplished in 110.4%.Dividend capacity of companies was significantly higher. However, in consultation with the Minister of Finance, it was decided that the dividends should be maintained at the current levels.