Days of controversy have ended with parliament’s finance committee giving the green light for US investment back Goldman Sachs to take a 19 percent stake in the state-owned energy providers DONG.

The deal, which has also made the two pension funds ATP and PFA Pension part-owners, was approved by the government with the assistance of opposition parties Venstre, Konservative and Liberal Alliance, but without the support of Dansk Folkeparti.

The deal means that Goldman Sachs will invest eight billion kroner in return for new DONG stock, thus diluting the state's share although but the majority of the shares will remain state-owned.

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Attempts to stall failed
The committee vote was held behind closed doors, but given that Venstre, Socialdemokraterne, Radikale, Liberal Alliance and Konservative had already announced that they would vote in favour of the deal, an agreement was always on the cards.

Jonas Dahl (SF), the tax minister this morning – he has since left the government coalition with the rest of SF – had been called in this morning to explain the DONG-GS deal to the finance committee.

Then Enhedslisten called a vote a little later in an attempt to postpone parliament from making a decision in the case, and the proposal, entitled ‘B30’, would send the prospective sale back to the finance committee for further deliberation.

But parliament voted against ‘B30’ and thus in favour of continuing the process, which led to the finance committee's vote at 1pm today.