Tokyo Electric Power Co is likely to sell a 20 percent stake in wind power developer Eurus Energy Holdings to trading firm Toyota Tsusho to help raise funds to compensate victims of Japan's nuclear crisis, a newspaper said on Sunday.

Tokyo Electric, the owner of the crippled Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant, is expected to sell the stake for a little less than 20 billion yen ($262 million) and post a profit of about 10 billion, which will be used for compensation, the Nikkei business daily reported.

The company, better known as Tepco, has issued a statement, saying that it has not made such a decision.

Tepco is still reeling from the radiation crisis at its Fukushima atomic plant triggered by the March 11 earthquake and tsunami in Japan's northeast.

It last month began accepting victims' applications for compensation, but the troubled utility needs to find funds to foot the cost and is seeking help from a taxpayer-funded bailout body.

Eurus Energy, currently owned 60 percent by Tepco and the rest by Toyota Tsusho, is Japan's biggest wind power developer and also operates wind power plants abroad.

Tepco is preparing an extraordinary operating plan, likely to include asset sales, cost cuts and other restructuring measures, and get government approval before receiving bailout funds.

(Reporting by Osamu Tsukimori; Editing by Yoko Nishikawa)

Japan