The Central Bank of Russia reports volume of loans offered by VUZ Bank to sole traders for 91 days to 180 days had plummeted by 100% (from 1.6 million RUR to zero) by April 1, 2009.

JP Morgan Chase Bank decreased its holding of Uralsvyazinform’s shares from 5.08% down to 1.83% Uralsvyazinform, one of the Urals’ major telecommunications provider, is unable to comment on the reasons for the bank’s decision just yet.

URSA Bank’s BOD Chairman and MDM-Bank’s Chairman of the Supervisory Board Igor Kim attended a meeting organized by President Dmitriy Medvedev to celebrate the Entrepreneur’s Day, URSA Bank’s press officer reports. Russia’s thirty leading businesspeople visited the executive mansion in Barvikha altogether, BOD Chairman of Kuzbassrazrezugol Coal Company Andrei Bokarev, BOD Chairman of Troika Dialog Group Ruben Vardanyan, BOD Chairman of Kaskol Management Company Sergey Nedoroslev, and President of Svyaznoy Group Maxim Nogotkov among them. Dmitriy Medvedev congratulated his guests on their

According to the Central Bank of Russia, volume of loans given by Perviy Respublikanskiy Bank to its customers despite overdraft had dropped by 100% (from 1.741 million RUR to zero) by April 1, 2009.

The famous supermarket chain is having its purchase system restructured, focusing on Russian goods in the country’s provinces, Auchan Russia’s Management Director announced at the State Duma Committee for Economic Policies and Entrepreneurship meeting recently. ‘80% of goods displayed on our shelves is actually produced in Russia. We are willing and ready to build up on our cooperation with the local manufacturers, because our customers’ choices are very important to us. The customers prefer locally made goods, and we are happy to give them a chance to buy those at Auchan. However, it’s

Life Banking Group is about to launch a new audacious advertising campaign in Yekaterinburg and Chelyabinsk. The start has been scheduled for June 2009, when twenty billboards are to appear in the cities’ major districts. The campaign’s piece de resistance is a sharp change in the ads’ content within two weeks of the launch. The campaign is estimated to cost 250,000 RUR in Yekaterinburg alone. The event is expected to target the potential private and business customers of Life Group’s Bank 24.ru’s new image. Admen believe the idea of carrying out a shocking advertising campaign during the off

The Central Bank of Russia reports volume of loans offered by UralTransBank to sole traders for 31 days to 90 days had gone down by 10.62% (from 167.658 million RUR to 149.842 million RUR) by April 1, 2009.

‘Sadly, we haven’t’ heard from Nikolai Kretov for quite a while now. Early in May, we were informed that the land allotment he’d received to put up an exhibition center was transferred to another company. The thing is, however, that this new company belongs to Kretov as well, which probably means that the man declared one of his businesses insolvent and transferred the allotment to his other company,’ Mayor of Yekaterinburg Arkadiy Chernetskiy said at Sverdlovsk Region’s Construction Committee. The land allotment in question was given to Leader Holding Company, run by Nikolai Kretov.

The Board of Directors of West Siberian Metallurgical Industrial Complex (Evraz Group member) suggested that the enterprise’s shareholders choose to pass the dividend for 2008 at the upcoming AGM. Similar recommendations were given to stockholders by the BODs of Evraz Group’s Vanadium and Vysokogorskiy ore mining and processing enterprises, both of which are located in Sverdlovsk Region.

Sverdlovsk Region Arbitration Court is going to consider the insolvency claims put forward by Leader Holding Company on May 26, 2009. The company placed its insolvency application with the court on April 28, 2009, so the court decided to institute legal proceedings to see how justified the company’s claims are. Prior to today’s hearing, the debtor must produce the accounting balance sheet for the last quarter (with the tax inspectorate officer’s approval), come up with the proof of getting loans, and produce evidence of having or not having assets as well as a number of other papers.

Sverdlovsk Region Arbitration Court is to consider the claim laid by Bank Severnaya Kazna against Mayak Corporation and Uralinvesttsentr on June 18, 2009. The plaintiff insists on the defendants paying the bank 183,048,144.65 RUR and on having their mortgaged property collected, the court’s press officer said to an UrBC reporter. The preliminary hearing took place on May 25, 2009. President of Mayak Corporation Marina Konkova declared earlier that the company was trying to get their loan debts restructured by the bank. ‘It turned out very difficult to get our payments prolonged and refinanced

Magnitogorsk Iron & Steel Works (MMK) presented it Mill 5000 potential at The Urals’ Industry, the first industrial exhibition in Tyumen. This exhibition was part of the project on the industrial development of the Urals’ north (known as The Industrial Urals-The Polar Urals Corporation). Chelyabinsk Region (which owns a shareholding in the corporation) presented over fifteen regional enterprises at the exhibition, including MMK. MMK’s PR Department reports the company’s stand displayed the capabilities of their future hot-roll Mill 5000 meant for manufacturing plate iron, with width

‘UC RUSAL’s Bogoslovskiy smelter carried out a detailed investigation of why the River Turiya, Sverdlovsk Region, had turned red. It was detected that the area around the company’s slurry pipeline got contaminated because the pipeline had leaked. So some of the slurry was washed down into the river with melt-water, coloring it red,’ the smelter reports. This means UC RUSAL’s enterprise actually admitted that their equipment did have some faults and deficiencies, whereas they had claimed earlier that the company had nothing to do with the contamination of the river. The local public

Kommersant-Dengi has recently compiled a list of Russia’s thirty banks most affected by the crisis, with Probusinessbank declared one of the country’s most unprofitable banks. The bank in question (which actually undertook the financial recovery of Yekaterinburg-based and infamously unprofitable Bank24.ru last year) was given the 13th position in the rating. Probusinessbnak’s losses amounted to 310.272 million RUR, the magazine reports.

According to Kommersant-Dengi, Bank Severnaya Kazna and Bank24.ru were on the list of Russia’s thirty most unprofitable banks as of April 1, 2009. Bank Severnaya Kazna (the asset of Alfa-Bank) was given the third position in the rating, with losses coming to 2,813,969,000 RUR, while Bank 24.ru (owned by Life Group) was given the 14th position in the rating, with losses reaching 289.657 million RUR.

Sverdlovsk Region Arbitration Court is to hold the preliminary hearing of the claim laid by Bank Severnaya Kazna against Mayak Corporation and Uralinvesttsentr on May 25, 2009. The plaintiff insists on the defendants paying the bank 183,048,144.65 RUR and on having their mortgaged property collected. President of Mayak Corporation Marina Konkova declared earlier that the company was trying to get their loan debts restructured by the bank. ‘It turned out very difficult to get our payments prolonged and refinanced for a longer period of time, despite our being the bank’s major customer and the

MRSK Urala decreased its electricity supply by 16.8% in the first quarter of 2009 compared with a year earlier, the company’s quarterly financial and performance report states. The useful electrical supply came to 17882.6 million kilowatt-hours, which falls short of the figures for a year earlier by 18.1%. At the same time, 2166.6 million kilowatt-hours worth of electricity was lost.

Governor of Chelyabinsk Region Petr Sumin intends to personally investigate the situation with the profit taxes paid earlier by the local enterprises that are to be paid back to them, he announced at an administrative meeting on May 25, 2009. According to the spokesperson for the Governor, the sum due to be paid back to businesses comes to more than eight billion rubles at the moment, including 1.07 billion RUR paid back in December 2008 and over 4 billion RUR paid back since the beginning of the year. At the same time, the regional budget’s profits dropped by 45% in the first quarter of 2009

‘The only reason we gave up on the idea of buying Bank Severnaya Kazna was that we had a certain upper price limit that we couldn’t afford to break during the negotiations. In fact, we did state this exact reason to the bank’s stockholders as soon as the talks were over,’ the spokesperson for AFK Sistema Yulia Belous said to an UrBC reporter. As it happens, the acquisition of Bank Severnaya Kazna by AFK Sistema (which was willing to handle the bank’s financial recovery) was cancelled at the last minute. The bank’s former BOD Chairman Vladimir Frolov later hinted at Sistema’s dubious paying

‘The economic crisis has made Auchan reconsider its plans to put up a number of new hypermarkets. They were going to build one in each of Yekaterinburg’s districts at first, but now they will only be able to set up two hypermarkets within a course of two to three years,’ says Deputy Mayor of Yekaterinburg Viktor Konteev’s press secretary Ilona Starodubtseva. ‘They are currently finalizing the details of the land allotment purchases. The new stores are to be located on the way out of town and will operate in much the same format as the existing ones,’ she explained.