Lufthansa is considering a buyout offer to Austrian Airlines' free float shareholders in its bid for the loss-making carrier, Austria's Takeover Commission said on Thursday.

The commission said such an offer was contingent on Lufthansa winning the ongoing tender of Austrian Airlines by state holding company OeIAG and other conditions, but that it would conform to Austria's takeover code.

The code requires a mandatory offer to outstanding shareholders if a buyer acquires control of a company. Under the rules, the offer must not be less than the average share price of the target company in the six months preceding the offer.

Austrian's average share price in the six months since April 23 is around 4.30 euros. At this price, the shares in the free float -- 48 percent of the share capital -- are worth EUR182 million euros (USD$234 million).

"Lufthansa is considering making a public offer to free float shareholders that conforms to the takeover code, should (its) final offer in this structured sales process be successful," the Takeover Commission said.

"Those considerations were discussed in informal talks with the Takeover Commission," it added.

The commission said its opinion was that after Wednesday's drop in Austrian Airlines' shares, Lufthansa had been obliged to disclose those considerations itself, and that it decided to publish its information because Lufthansa did not.

Austrian Airlines shares dropped 30 percent on Wednesday, closing at 2.85 euros. They were suspended on Thursday ahead of the commission's statement 21 percent to trade at 3.45 euros later in the afternoon.

Lufthansa declined to comment after the commission's statement was sent out.

The sale of a government stake in the airline was thrown into doubt this week when shortlisted bidders pulled out or asked for an extension of the process, leaving Lufthansa as the only serious contender, according to sources close to the deal.

Lufthansa, Air France-KLM and Russia's S7 were shortlisted by OeIAG in the sale of the Austrian Airlines stake.

Air France said it had not submitted an offer by OeIAG's Tuesday deadline but was interested in further talks. S7 said it had sent a letter but several sources close to the deal have said the letter did not contain the binding bid OeIAG had asked for.

According to those sources, only Lufthansa has actually made a proper offer. Austrian media reports said that Lufthansa too was asking to postpone the process by two months, or was demanding Austrian's debt be cut off.

The commission said that the Lufthansa and OeIAG positions in the sale process were so different that it could not rule out the deal never coming to fruition.

"Against the backdrop of Austrian Airlines' economic development and apparently diverging positions in the negotiations, it is currently uncertain whether a deal will materialize," it said in its statement.