‘The business center hasn’t been able to sell or rent PARKKING Club’s ‘Golden Hall’ yet. The price of a square meter still comes to 200,000 RUR, the total area of the hall is 1,080 square meters,’ Antey Business Center’s Renting Department Manager Natalya Motovilova said to an UrBC reporter. Antey’s management offered one of PARKKING Club’s fully equipped halls with a separate entrance in Malyshev St. for sale, but they have been unable to find a customer for four months already. Nevertheless, there are no plans to reduce the price. The business center’s representatives have declared earlier

Central Bank of Russia reports volume of non-state for-profit organizations’ deposits in SberInvestBank valid for up to 30 days dropped by 100% (from 200 million RUR to zero) in January-August 2008.

According to the Central Bank of Russia, volume of loans given by Sverdlovsk Gubernskiy Bank to sole traders for 1 to 3 years went down by 34.66% (from 333.034 million RUR to 217.578 million RUR) in January-August 2008.

‘The Russian suppliers do not always pay much attention to the contract terms, as they are subconsciously lulled by the famous brand’s name. Local people tend to believe that a globally recognized player coming on the Russian market is by definition responsible and honest,’ Alliance Non-Commercial Partnership’s CEO Alexei Podolyako notes. ‘What is more, these suppliers feel positive that if a company is so demanding on their part, it automatically guarantees the same responsibility level and will meet its contractual obligations scrupulously, at least. The suppliers assume that such a

The Ural Bank for Reconstruction and Development is going to support the Start-Up 2008 Forum on October 24, 2008 in Yekaterinburg. This project is targeted at supporting Yekaterinburg’s small business sector. ‘As is well known, it is this entrepreneurial segment that needs the NGOs, banks, venture funds, and insurers’ special attention. These organizations’ representatives will take part in the forum’s events,’ the spokesperson for the bank explained to UrBC. The Ural Bank for Reconstruction and Development’s experts will make their reports at the seminar on Growing Business Management and

Yekaterinburg’s future Academic district is a grand-scale project. The things Renova-StroyGroup-Akademicheskoye has already done leave no one doubting that the project will definitely be completed. The national Affordable Housing project is impossible to implement through putting separate buildings sporadically within the existing city’s boundaries, so large-scale multi-faceted area development appears to be a solution to the problem. Academic is a project of such kind quite unique to Russia, as the builders are working on a whole new city district,’ says Ural Chamber of Real Estate’s CEO

‘The country has been experiencing a shortage of open wagons for three years now because of the industrial production growth. Uralvagonzavod makes 25,000 to 26,000 open wagons a month, but the shortage will probably still be felt for another four to five years,’ Deputy Director of Pervaya Gruzovaya Kompaniya Mikhail Kryazhevskikh said in the course of a conference in Yekaterinburg. ‘Some people think we take and use up all the open wagons, but Russian Railways Public Company actually operates 257,737 wagons, only 47,000 of which we will get to own. The company has yielded 46,000 open wagons

Chairman of Magnitogorsk Iron & Steel Works (MMK) BOD Viktor Rashnikov was featured in Kommersant’s rating of Russia’s most professional managers. The Top 1000 Russian Managers is the rating compiled jointly by Kommersant Publishing House and the Russian Managers Association. The rating has been complied on an annual basis since 2001; it’s targeted at bringing the country’s most professional executives and branch leaders into the limelight. In terms of methodology, the best are selected by the best: evaluation is given by the representatives of the country’s business communities

Central Bank of Russia reports volume of loans given by Uralprivatbank to sole traders for 1 to 3 years went down by 22.88% (from 78.215 million RUR to 60.319 million RUR) in January-August 2008.

The opening of Hyatt Regency Ekaterinburg Hotel has been once again postponed till December 1, 2008, Deputy Mayor of Yekaterinburg Viktor Konteev announced at an Interregional Forum of Real Estate Market Players on September 24, 2008. The project managers claimed at the end of 2006 that the construction would be finished in 2007, while the five-star hotel would be commissioned at the beginning of 2008. Then the opening date was put off till May 2008 and then till the fall of 2008. It has been unofficially reported in the meanwhile that Hyatt Regency Ekaterinburg will only start working

‘A lot of water will have passed under the bridge by February 2009 when UralTransBank will allegedly get the loan. In fact, only very few regional banks manage to attract some European money successfully, so the bank Chairman’s claim might only serve to calm the customers who have been disturbed by the market situation,’ says FPG Neva’s Yekaterinburg branch’s director Alexei Pozdeev. UralTransBank’s Chairman Valeriy Zavodov said in the course of several interviews that the bank intended to get a syndicated loan on the international capital market in February or March 2009. Zavodov explained

Central Bank of Russia reports volume of loans given by UralTransBank to sole traders for up to 30 days dropped by 68.59% (from 63.577 million RUR to 19.969 million RUR) in January-August 2008.

‘We have been getting a lot of complaints about unreliable travel agents. 90% of claims laid against travel agencies are related to service agreement violations or mistakes in these agreements. I feel that once the accreditation procedure becomes obligatory, the number of complaints will go down, while the certificate will prove an agent’s dependability,’ head of Sverdlovsk Region’s division of Rospotrebnadzor (the state consumer rights watchdog) Consumer Rights Department Natalya Afanasieva announced in the course of a press conference. ‘To go through with the accreditation, one has to

Aeroflot Russian Airlines canceled the agreement it had signed with Aeroflot Don, its daughter enterprise, and announced the two carriers would no longer operated flights together, the spokesperson for Aeroflot reports. Both airlines started using their own code and flag on September 20, 2008. Besides, D9 745/746 Moscow-Yekaterinburg-Moscow, D9 733/734 Moscow-Yekaterinburg-Moscow, and D9 899/900 Moscow-Chelyabinsk-Moscow flights that were formerly operated by Aeroflot will be operated by Aeroflot Don under D9 code using Aeroflot Don’s B737-500 aircraft from September 20, 2008 till October 25,

Central Bank of Russia reports volume of loans given by Bank24.r to private individuals for 181 days to 1 year went down by 44.89% (from 27.573 million RUR to 15.195 million RUR) in January-August 2008.

‘Some special asset management centers will be set up in places where there are a lot of industrial enterprises, since it’s very difficult to run a huge corporation from a single center,’ First Deputy GD of Rostechnologii State Corporation Alexei Aleshin announced at a conference devoted to the Mid-Urals’ machine-building industry’s modernization and development in 2008-2020. Alexei Aleshin explained that nineteen holdings would be set up within the defense industry and at least four holdings would be created for the civil industries.

‘Raising the maximum insurance sum on deposits up to 700,000 RUR is a logical and long-awaited step on the way to the deposit insurance system’s further development. In fact, the sum has already been raised several times before,’ SKB-Bank’s Sales Support Director Denis Belogurov said to UrBC. Meanwhile, the state-run Deposit Insurance Agency’s Board of Directors admitted recently that it was possible to increase the amount from 400,000 RUR to 700,000 RUR. ‘People have been keeping increasingly more money on deposits over the last few years, so raising the insurance sum is definitely a timely

‘There are certain criteria to use when deciding on a dwellings’ affordability. If 30% to 40% of the population can afford to buy a place at the existing price, the housing in the country is really affordable. This covers purchases made with the help of mortgages and savings plans, too,’ Ural Chamber of Real Estate’s CEO Rustem Galeev says. ‘Some people keep wondering if those millions of square meters of housing in Yekaterinburg’s future Academic district will enjoy any demand at all. I am convinced that the answer is ‘yes’, as available housing is still a problem in Yekaterinburg. Thousands

‘The state of events on the global financial markets makes it difficult to apply for syndicated loans. The fact that UralTransBank is planning to get one is rather surprising, as small banks don’t have any access to the international capital market at the moment,’ Unicom Partner Investment and Finance Company’s executive Sergey Kaliberda said to an UrBC reporter. UralTransBank’s Chairman Valeriy Zavodov said in the course of several interviews that the bank intended to get a syndicated loan on the international capital market in February or March 2009. Zavodov explained the company was

Mayor of Yekaterinburg Arkadiy Chernetskiy met Auchan’s representatives to look into the chain store’s development strategy in Yekaterinburg and in Russia on the whole. Auchan’s executives said they intended to set up four more hypermarkets in Yekaterinburg and were looking for the remaining two land allotments at the moment. One of them needs to be located next to Chelyabinsk highway, the other one should be found in the city’s east end. The company asked the mayor to help them find the suitable sites.