LUKoil, Russia's largest privatized oil company, has canceled a plan to sell 10 percent of its stock for cash, but will auction off a much smaller stake this month, senior company officials said Monday.


Sergei Labazov, vice-president of LUKoil in charge of stock operations, said in a telephone interview that the company is no longer planning the sale of a 10-percent stake that it first announced earlier this year.


"We're not considering selling a 10-percent stake any more," he said. He would not specify why the long-awaited selloff had been called off.


Investors, however, will be offered a little consolation this month with the sale of an 0.08 percent stake at a special cash auction designed to cover privatization expenses, according to Leonid Fedun, vice president in charge of privatization. Fedun said the auction would take place before Oct. 20.


At the current market price of LUKoil stock -- about 119,000 ($45) -- the value of the 77,000 shares to be offered at the auction would be more than $3 million.


Labazov said that LUKoil, which accounts for almost 15 percent of Russia's total oil output, is still planning to put up 20.4 percent of its shares at investment tender under its privatization plan. The date for the tender has not yet been set, Labazov said.


LUKoil officials have long planned to sell off part of the government's 45-percent share in the company. In June, they proposed that 10 percent be sold at an additional voucher auction, but authorities failed to approve the plan before voucher privatization ended June 30. In early September, LUKoil announced the sale of the same stake for cash, but Labazov said Monday that this auction would not happen either.


However, even the tiny, 0.08-percent stake in LUKoil promises to attract major players in the country's burgeoning stock market, according to Fedun. "The interest in the selloff is huge," he said.