Autoland Holding might no longer be Yekaterinburg’s only official Ford dealer: ‘Ford Motor Company is trying to build its share of the Russian market on the whole and of Yekaterinburg one in particular. This is why Ford is now coordinating a tender for another dealer in Yekaterinburg,’ Ford Motor Company’s PR Director Ekaterina Kulinenko said to an UrBC reporter. ‘Preference will be given to candidates with some successful experience of doing car business in the region, provided they produce some documented proof of their rights over the land allotment and the buildings that they plan to use

On August 26, 2009, MDM Bank made 228.125 million RUR worth of coupon payments on its LPN bond issue. The coupon yield was determined at 9.125% a year. The bank went through with the five-billion-ruble LPN Eurobond issue on February 26, 2007; the bonds are to be in circulation for three years. The issue was instituted by Ireland-based URSA Finance PLC and coordinated by Citigroup and Standard Bank.

‘Sverdlovsk Region’s foreign trade turnover amounted to $4.5bn in the first half of the year, which was 37% less than a year earlier. The drop can be largely explained by the plummeting metal prices,’ the region’s Minister for International and Foreign Economic Relations Alexander Kharlov announced at a meeting with the Minister Counsellor (Economic and Trade & Investment) at the UK Embassy in Moscow Caroline Wilson. ‘Nevertheless, the share of exported machine-building produce was actually on the increase. The ministry is now looking for the potential markets and investigating the global

Sverdlovsk Region Arbitration Court ruled that AMUR car factory should undergo bankruptcy proceedings, with Evgeniy Fedotovskih of the Ural Self-Regulatory Organization of Trustees in Bankruptcy Noncommercial Partnership as the plant’s trustee in bankruptcy. The company, whose majority shareholder is Pavel Chernavin, is to undergo the proceedings until December 21, 2009, the spokesperson for the court explained.

Magnitogorsk Iron & Steel Works (MMK) managed to save over 800 million RUR in the first half of 2009 thanks to better organization and stricter control over the manufacturing process. For one, MMK’s specific consumption of coke and iron needed to produce cast iron decreased by 19.7 and 4.5 kilograms per ton, respectively, against the ante-crisis levels. What is more, the enterprise also used fewer ferrous alloys and supplementary materials, which resulted in a 212-ruble drop in the prime cost of a ton of goods, MMK’s PR Department reports. In order to fight the recession, the company is

The Federal Insurance Surveillance Service revoked the licenses of four Sverdlovsk Region-based insurers, halted the licenses of three more insurance companies, and limited two insurers’ rights to issue obligatory civil liability car insurance policies. The corresponding decrees are to come into force on August 27, 2009. For one, the Service’s Order 442 revoked the license of Koltso Urala Insurance Company (license number С 1173 66, serial number1173, Yekaterinburg) due to the latter’s failing to eliminate the insurance legislation offenses within the given time limit.

Bankir.ru recently quoted Kompaniya’s report on the profits and losses of the Russian banks that underwent financial recovery procedures in the last few months. According to the data provided, Bank24.ru lost 310.7 million RUR in the first half of 2009. At the same time, the losses of Bank Severnaya Kazna, whose financial recovery was supervised by Alfa-Bank, amounted to 3,985.6 million RUR in the six months of the year. As for Bank24.ru, over 90% of its shares were acquired by AKB Probusinessbank and a number of this bank’s top executives in December 2008 so that the former could undergo

MDM Bank is processing the documents that will allow the company to receive a syndicated $175m loan coordinated by the IFC and a team of lead organizers, the bank’s press officer reports. According to the preliminary terms of the one-year loan, the bank will have to pay a LIBOR+4% annual interest rate, with the money paid in one installment at the end of the loan period. This money is meant to support the bank’s trade financing projects. The bank reports the International Finance Corporation (IFC), CALYON, ING Bank N.V., Raiffeisen Zentralbank Oesterreich AG, Standard Chartered Bank, and VTB

‘Early in August 2009, Nizhniy Tagil’s for-profit enterprises owed us over 35 million RUR for the supplied electricity. We have got eighty-six debtors in the city at the moment,’ Tagilenergo Municipal Unitary Enterprise’s Deputy Director for Economics and Finance Olga Kraeva announced at a meeting dedicated to the debts the electricity supplier cannot seem to collect. ‘It’s true that thanks to the city council’s personal efforts, some progress has been made, but the debt paying-off rate is still very slow. Only six for-profit companies have paid off their electricity debts in full so far. All

Sverdlovsk Region division of the Federal Antimonopoly Service (FAS) is to keep investigating case 55 involving Koltsovo Airport of Yekaterinburg on August 26, 2009. The airport is charged with violating Article 10 (part 1, paragraph 1) of the Federal Competition Protection Act 135-FZ as of July 26, 2006. Namely, the airport is accused of setting and maintaining monopolistically high prices for ground services. For one, this includes the fees for a telescopic boarding bridge, jet fuel, in-flight meals, and passenger transit.

The sales volumes of Beliy Veter Tsifrovoy, the consumer electronic chain, dropped by 12% in the first half of 2009 compared with the year earlier. At the same time, the chain store’s debts to banks and suppliers have gone down by 630 million RUR since the beginning of the year. The company’s experts report the Russian consumer electronics market shrank by something between 32% and 45% in the six months of 2009 against the first half of 2008. ‘Like most of our counterparts, we had a 28% decrease in sales in the first half of the year compared with the year earlier. The sales of laptops and

Uralvagonzavod Scientific and Production Enterprise’s civilian goods output declined by 60.5% over January to July 2009. At the same time, the civilian goods produced by this company make up 32.7% of the entire industrial branch’s civilian outputs, the Russian Federation Ministry for Industry and Trade reports. The enterprise has halted its railway carriage production process twice this year because of the Russian Railways Public Company’s zero demand. All in all, Uralvagonzavod has produced 31,870 gondola cars since the beginning of the year, which only comes to 32% of last year’s output.

Ural Airlines official website’s users have been offered an option of searching for the most suitable ticket prices via the carrier’s online booking office. The search engine now provides the users with ticket prices relevant not only to the date one enters, but also to three days before and after the entered date. ‘We are trying to improve on our customer service, so the website’s technological perfections are one of the focal areas of the airline’s development. The new service will be especially handy for passengers who wish to save money and can afford to reschedule the dates by a few

Sverdlovsk Gubernskiy Bank (SGB) is launching a special offer that will allow its customers to visit their relatives in Asia. Any customer who uses the bank’s money order system to transfer some sum to Azerbaijan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, or Uzbekistan between August 24, 2009 and October 28, 2009 will get a chance to win a return ticket to one of the above-mentioned countries. The departure will take place in any Russian city where SGB’s outlet can be found. Among the money order systems available at the bank are Western Union and Unistream. ‘Both of these systems have their strong points.

Bank Severnaya Kazna (the asset of Alfa-Bank) will no longer support the 3D-Secure technology, the bank’s official website reports. This means that, starting from September 1, 2009, the bank’s customers will be unable to carry out enhanced-security transactions with the help of their Visa Classic, Visa Gold, Visa Business, Visa Virtuon, or Visa Platinum cards at Verified by Visa online stores.

Bank Severnaya Kazna (the asset of Alfa-Bank) has recently informed its business customers about the upcoming changes in the bank’s cash and settlement services. For one, the writing-off transactions will take longer starting September 15, 2009. This means the money will be actually written off one’s account only the day after the bank has received the invoice documents. In addition, the basic commissions charged for services rendered to legal entities, sole traders, and private self-employed individuals will go up on October 1, 2009. This increase is to affect both the Russian ruble and the

Ural Airlines will be offering special prices for Beijing flights operated on Wednesdays between August 26, 2009 and September 30, 2009. Provided you travel to China within this time period and go back to Yekaterinburg within five days, the return ticket will only cost ?379. This is a limited offer, however. ‘We are thus offering the Ural dwellers a chance to spend a long weekend in Beijing; they can also plan a grand shopping tour there,’ the carrier reports. In fact, the airline operates two direct flights to Beijing a week, that is, on Wednesdays and Sundays. Experts believe these flights’

Wire mill 170 was recently repaired at Magnitogorsk Iron & Steel Works (MMK). The seven-day repairs were carried out in accordance with the enterprise’s schedule, and MMK Group’s Mechanical Repairs Center, Metallurgspetsstroyremont, Magnitogorsk Maintenance Center, and Electroremont acted as the project’s contractors. The repairs included replacing the mill’s inner lining with some new substitutes and checking, repairing, and replacing the mill’s mechanical parts. Now the wire mill 170 has been launched, all of MMK shop’s three units became fully functional, MMK PR Department reports.

The Human Resources Department of Magnitogorsk Iron & Steel Works (MMK) won in the fifth All-Russian HR of the Year contest. The competition is targeted at highlighting and sharing personnel management experience as well as at public promotion of the country’s most efficient HR departments. MMK’s PR Department reports the competition Board spoke very highly of MMK’s impressive personnel policies that rely on modern methods and formats. ‘Employee retention and providing workers with jobs under the recession is the main positive outcome of the enterprise’s crisis-defying action plan adopted

Governor of Chelyabinsk Region Petr Sumin chaired the regional anti-terrorist committee meeting recently. The main point on the agenda had to do with anti-terrorist protection of local schools and colleges. According to the regional Education Minister Vladimir Sadyrin, over 3,113 local schools, kindergartens, and colleges welcomed students on September 1, 2009; all of these have already been examined by the ministry’s experts and law-enforcement officers. The educational establishments based in Miass, Kartalinskiy district, and Lokomotivniy proved to be best protected from the possible