Fitch Ratings, the international rating agency, promoted URSA Bank’s Rating Outlook from Stable to Positive. The bank’s Issuer Default Rating was affirmed at B, its individual rating at D in both short- and long-term; its support rating was affirmed at 5 and level of long-term IDR support was affirmed as missing.. ‘This positive rating results from URSA Bank’s recent issue of $408 million worth of preference shares and the rate the bank uses on its mortgages and car loans; credit cards offered to borrowers with a nice credit record were another factor,’ Fitch Ratings says referring to Alexei

According to the Central Bank of Russia, volume of non-profit NGOs’ deposits in Yekaterinburg Municipal Bank valid for 1 to 3 years went down by 59.41% (from 31.78 million RUR to 12.9 million RUR) in January-August 2007.

SKB-Bank set up new offices in Noviy Urengoy and Rostov-on-Don, the bank’s press officer reports. The two offices are located within 3,500 kilometers of one another; this distance covers twenty more subsidiaries, offices, and representations of the bank, with the total number of the company’s outlets all over Russia coming to nearly eighty units. The additional offices are located at 8 Leningradskiy Ave. in Noviy Urengoy and at 144a Pushkinskaya St. in Rostov-on-Don. Both places welcome private customers from 9 AM to 7 PM on weekdays and from 9 AM to 4 PM on weekends. Legal entities can use

‘Speaking of possible changes in the way loans are given in this country, one should bear in mind that these are mainly financial intermediaries that actually have a sort of borrowing policy, which means these changes will above all affect the Central Bank of Russia and other Russian banks. As for the Central Bank of Russia, it will probably try to liberalize the assets it uses as collaterals for lombard loans and repurchase agreements. This way the authorities are hoping to be able to improve the refinancing mechanisms while the global stock market appears to be so unstable,’ Vsevolod

Pervouralsk New Pipe Plant’s 10,000,000th ton of pipe goods was produced at the company’s first pipe-rolling shop recently; it took the enterprise 71 years to reach this figure after the pipe-forming machine was first launched. The spokesperson for Pervouralsk New Pipe Plant (part of ChTPZ Group) says their pipe-rolling mill 220 is unique in that while its design and the technology it uses are not very complicated, the mill is capable of producing the plant’s widest range of weldless hot-rolled pipes (with the diameter ranging from 114 to 219 millimeters) from different kinds of steel. The

According to the Central Bank of Russia, volume of loans given by Ural Innovational Commercial Bank to natural persons for 1 to 3 years goes down 57.61% (from 27.811 million RUR to 11.791 million RUR) in January-August 2007.

Central Bank of Russia reports volume of for-profit self-regulatory organizations’ deposits in VUZ Bank valid for 181 days to 1 year went down by 70.71% (from 283.068 million RUR to 82.928 million RUR) in January-August 2007.

‘RUSAL is going to implement six social welfare programs in Sverdlovsk Region according to a certain schedule. Each program has some strict deadlines. A presentation called One Hundred Cool Projects has already taken place in Yekaterinburg. The next point on the agenda is moving on to the Step over the Horizon program,’ RUSAL Social Welfare Projects Center CEO Igor Sukhotin said to UrBC. The One Hundred Cool Projects contest has been held for the fifth time this year; it was the first time the contest was hosted by Sverdlovsk Region. Principals, teachers, and students from a number of

A letter addressed to Alfa Bank’s Internet Bank customers was spammed around on September 26, 2007. The letter used Alfa Bank’s branded logos and letterheads; it also contained some information about the bank’s license details. At the same time, the contents of the letter give one grounds for suspecting it could be part of a swindle aimed at getting hold of the customers’ personal data and accessing their accounts. The letter reads as follows: Dear Alfa Client Online User, Due to the fact that Alfa Bank possesses some data on the increasing rate of IT-crime targeted at stealing money from the

Central Bank of Russia reports volume of natural persons’ demand deposits and investments in Uralprivatbank went down by 17.34% (from 18.916 million RUR to 15.637 million RUR) in January-August 2007.

Central Bank of Russia reports volume of non-profit NGOs’ deposits in Tyumenenergobank valid for over 3 years went down by 84.38% (from 1.6 million RUR to 250,000 RUR) in January-August 2007.

‘We’ve taken a number of decisions aimed at fighting the unscrupulous players on the financial market as well as at restraining the media that engage in providing the public with legally inaccurate information; in addition, some measures will be taken to enhance the people’s economic literacy,’ Director of BrokerCreditService Company’s Yekaterinburg branch Viktor Nemikhin said after attending a meeting on counter-fraud policies on stock markets. This meeting was coordinated by National Association of Securities Market Participants (NAUFOR)’s Ural branch and the local division of Federal

The Future Development Forum proceedings were resumed in Yekaterinburg on September 26, 2007. ‘I’m pleased to see that our forum managed to grab the attention of experts from management companies, builders and developers, investment funds, banks, and many other people that contribute to the way Yekaterinburg looks today,’ Deputy Mayor Viktor Konteev declared in the course of the opening ceremony. The ceremony itself took place in Moskovskaya Gorka Hotel on September 25, 2007; the hotel also hosted a conference on selective-entry unit investment funds for businesses, real estate, protection

Sukhoi Superjet 100’s first public presentation has recently taken place in Komsomolsk-on-Amur. The event gave all the project participants (Sukhoi employees and the company’s partners and suppliers) a chance to get together for the first time. The presentation was also attended by First Deputy Head of Government Sergey Ivanov. Sukhoi’s first customers, including Aeroflot, Ural Airlines, Dalavia, and Air Union, were also invited. Ural Airline’s press officer reports the plane presented is fully prepared for flight trials, with body, planes, fins, and engines all pieced together safely. The

URSA Bank paid $114.5 million on Uralvneshtorgbank’s one-year Eurobonds (this comprises both the sum itself and the interest) on September 21, 2007. URSA Bank accepted this liability since it was actually born out of Uralvneshtorgbank’s merger with SibAcademBank in December 2006. The principal amounted to $110 million; the interest came to $4.5 million. Uralvneshtorgbank went through with the Eurobond issue in September 2006 when the demand outstripped the supply impressively, reaching over $210 million. Investors from Switzerland, Great Britain, Germany, Luxembourg, Hungary, Chile, the

SKB-Bank’s consumer loan portfolio reached 9,259,040,000 RUR on September 1, 2007, which means SKB-Bank became Sverdlovsk Region’s largest bank in terms of consumer lending and got on Ural Federal District’s Top 3 banks list. The volume of consumer loans offered by the bank has grown by 4,225,876,000 RUR, or 84%, since the beginning of the year, whereas the loan portfolio quality has traditionally remained outstanding, with the proportion of bad debt coming to a mere 2%. SKB-Bank’s press officer reports theirs is the best growth rate in the entire Ural Region.

‘One of the city’s future districts known as Academic is currently under construction in Yekaterinburg. We have already thought through the landscape design of these 1,200 hectares of land; high-rise buildings will be intermingled with green zones, and there will also be a 400-hectare park,’ head of Valode & Pistre Jean Pistre announced at the Future Development Forum on September 26, 2007. ‘Another thing we intend to do is use energy-saving technologies for this district, as we are trying to make sure the future dwellers get the best living conditions there are,’ M. Pistre said.

‘We are going to once again look into Home Credit and Finance Bank’s activity in the nearest future because we have been getting innumerous complaints lately,’ Natalia Afanasieva, Consumer Rights Protection Director of regional division of Rospotrebnadzor (the state consumer rights watchdog) said to UrBC. According to head of Rospotrebnadzor Gennady Onischenko, they keep receiving plenty of complaints related to banks’ performance, and most of them are targeted against Home Credit and Finance Bank Ltd. ‘This is not the first time the bank is going to be inspected. We first investigated their

The city council executives gave a report on the budget administration in the first half of 2007 to Yekaterinburg Municipal Duma Deputies in the course of the Duma’s 45th session. According to Andrey Koryukov (the council’s Finance and Budget Director), the budget revenues came to 7.952 billion RUR, or 46% of the planned amount, in January-June 2007. The better part of revenues (5,461 billion) came from taxes and non-tax revenues. In addition, 1.863 billion RUR were donated by Sverdlovsk Region in the form of subsidies and grants. The budget expenditures amounted to 7.34 billion RUR, or 38.7%

Governor of Chelyabinsk Region Petr Sumin met President of Rosptitsesoyuz Vladimir Fisinin, President of Germany-based Lomann Rudolf Preisenger and General Director of Chelyabinsk poultry plant Vladimir Murashov. The spokesperson for the Governor reports the entrepreneurs arrived in Chelyabinsk region in order to attend Lomann’s annual seminar; the thing is, birds of Lomann’s cross are raised at Chelyabinsk poultry plant. Vladimir Fisinin says poultry farms are developing all over Russia in a rather successful way, with Chelyabinsk Region outstripping all the other parts of the country in