MOSCOW, January 19 - RAPSI, Natalia Belova. A commercial court postponed on Thursday until February 8 its hearing of the Central Bank's lawsuit against the Severnaya Verf (Northern Shipyard) shipbuilding plant's shareholders, whose shares were pledged under loans totaling $1 billion to Mezhprombank, the Russian Legal Information Agency (RAPSI/rapsinews.com) reports from the courtroom.

In October, the court ordered an expert appraisal of the pledged shares to be completed by December 20. Deloitte & Touche CIS was appointed by the court to conduct the appraisal. It requested additional materials and the extension of the deadline until February 29.

The court turned down the request on Wednesday arguing that all the document requisite for the appraisal had been provided and the shipyard added that some documents requested by the appraiser were forwarded on January 17.

The court ordered to deliver the appraisal report by February 1.

To the judge's question whether an appraisal is possible without additional documents Deloitte & Touche said "yes" at the previous hearing, but added that then it would contain errors worth billions of rubles and they would have to use secret information making the report classified.

According to Mezhprombank, the pledged shares were also later pledged upon the Central Bank's approval with Mezhprombank under another 7 billion ruble ($221 million) loan to the shipyard's parent company. These shares account for a 50-percent plus one share stake, while 75.82 percent of the shares were pledged with the Central Bank under the loan agreements.