UrBC, Moscow, April 22, 2011. Russian Railways are planning to raise its freight fares by 3.8% in the year 2011, RBC refers to the company’s head Vladimir Yakunin as saying. ‘My proposal is to go with a 3.8% indexation and to consider some additional subsidies in the year 2012 to make sure the company can meet its goals. We can provide 40bn RUR ourselves (which will also cover taking out a loan) and we expect the government to allocate another 40bn RUR using the budgetary resources,’ he declared.

Elizabeth Hafner, Director for Russia and Eurasia US Trade is going to visit Yekaterinburg on April 26, 2011. Ms Hafner is expected to meet the members of Sverdlovsk Region Union of Industrialists & Entrepreneurs, to give a speech to the students of a local college, and to take part in the session of the Presidential Program Alumni Association’s top club dedicated to the benefits of joining the WTO in terms of innovational economic development. As far as Ural Federal District goes, Ms Hafner is also going to pay a visit to Tyumen.

Russia’s Federal Financial Markets Service decided to halt the share issue of Yekaterinburg-based Ural Transportation Machine-Building Plant’s ordinary registered paperless shares. The additional share issue was registered as 1-01-55454-E-002D on March 29, 2011.

Bank Severnaya Kazna stopped operating as a legal entity with such a name on April 20, 2011. The application for listing the bank as liquidated through a merger was placed with the state body in charge of registering legal entities. The Bank of Russia announced in late March that Bank Severnaya Kazna had begun merging with Alfa-Bank.

The international rating agency downgraded the Russian telecommunications operator VimpelCommunications long-term credit rating as well as the accompanying liabilities ratings from BB+ to BB. The ratings were also taken off the CreditWatch list, with Negative rating outlook. The rating agency’s analysts feel that the acquisition of Wind Telecom will increase VimpelCom and VimpelCom Ltd’s liabilities burden considerably, which means this debt load will not meet the BB+ criteria.

SkyExpress halted the operation of flights from Tyumen on April 18, 2011. Passengers with tickets for the flights that have been cancelled can either travel to Moscow from Yekaterinburg or Chelyabinsk or get their money back. Passengers who want to take the plane after April 18, 2011, will be notified by our Booking Center in a timely manner. They will be offered airplane tickets for Yekaterinburg-Moscow or Chelyabinsk-Moscow flights instead, or they can apply for a refund in accordance with the existing reimbursement regulations,’ the company’s official release says.

The Russian National Association of Securities Market Participants (NAUFOR) reports sixteen companies have been excluded from its membership. Following the applications to this extent, placed by the companies themselves, North-Western Management Company based in Saint Petersburg, Con-Trust based in Kurgan, Moscow’s Absolut Bank, Moscow-based Deutsche Security, Intellect-Capital Financial Company of Kemerovo, Starfin based in Moscow, and First Czech-Russian bank based in Moscow are now no longer NAUFOR members. Chelyabinsk-based Milcom-Invest has been excluded for not paying its membership

Russia’s Federal Antimonopoly Service declared that Russian Railways violated Article 17 of the Federal Competition Protection Act (the one which prohibits favoritism towards a bidder in an auction), FAS’s press service reports. The company’s offense consisted in the following: Russian Railways conducted its Tender 907 on thirteen different offers; eight lots consisted in the opportunity to sign car insurance agreements with Russian Railways subsidiaries in 2010-2013, that is, for the duration of three years. Under the terms of the auction, applicants had to submit proofs of their automobile

Experts from Bank Koltso Urala took part in a trade and economic conference with the representatives of the Czech business community. The event was coordinated by Sverdlovsk Region Government and took place in the Hyatt Regency Yekaterinburg Hotel. Among the reports presented at the conference were those made by Sverdlovsk Region Minister for Industry & Science Alexander Petrov, the Czech Industry & Trade Minister Martin Kocourek, the Czech Republic’s deputy Agriculture Minister Juraj Chmiel, and the CEO of the Chamber of Commerce & Industry for the CIS František Masopust. The

The administration of Sredneuralsky Copper-Smelting Plant will have to face administrative prosecution because of some labor legislation violations, the spokesperson for Sverdlovsk Region’s public prosecution authorities reports. An inspection by the prosecution authorities and the officers from the regional division of Rostechnadzor (the state technological safety watchdog) revealed that the gangways and fencing at the copper smelting department’s furnace charge sector were out of order; moreover, the enterprise does not check the buildings of its departments for sturdiness on a regular

Uralredmet decided not to declare or distribute any dividend for 2010. The decision was made at the company’s annual general meeting on April 15, 2011 in Verkhyaya Pyshma, Sverdlovsk Region.

UrBC, Magnitogorsk, Chelyabinsk Region, April 20, 2011. Magnitogorsk Iron & Steel Works (MMK) was tested by a group of experts from Renault-Nissan recently; the object of the inspection was the company’s quality management system. The experts spent two days meeting MMK management and qualified employees as well as visiting the production departments in charge of making automobile body sheets, namely, sheet-rolling shop 5 and the coating department. The experts looked into how well the company’s quality management system meets the ASAS-P standards, those of the unified assessment system of

Egypt’s Tourism Ministry is launching an advertising campaign in Russia aimed at promoting the Red Sea holidays. The Ministry intends to spend over $3bn on the project, the Director of the tourism department of the Embassy of Egypt in Moscow Nahed Nazmi Ayad Khan told RIA Novosti. The large-scale Egypt-promoting campaign will hit the Russian television, radio, and shopping malls on April 25, 2011. What is more, we are also planning on coordinating plenty of events in Sharm El Sheikh and Hurghada as well as Moscow to support travel there. Among such events are, for example, music festivals,’

The Japanese car manufacturer Nissan announced its Leaf power trucks had to be called off for maintenance due to a possible electronic gear deficiency, Auto.Lenta.Ru reports. About 5.3 million cars will have to be recalled altogether: this is exactly the number of automobiles produced since the time of the launch.

Pipe Metallurgical Company (TMK) came up with a performance report for the first quarter of 2011. The company shipped to consumers 1.07 million tons of steel pipes, which was 15.4% better than in the first quarter of 2010 and nearly on a level with the record-setting figures of the last quarter of 2010. In the first three months of 2011, TMK delivered to customers about 108,000 tons of premium tubing joints designed by the company’s Russian (TMK family) and American (ULTRA) branches; this exceeded the figures for the fourth quarter of 2010 by 20.6%. The share of ULTRA-manufactured joints

The stockholders of AKB Rosbank decided in the course of an extraordinary general meeting that the bank should get reorganized through a merger with Bank Société Générale Vostok. The decision was made on April 15, 2011, and the Bank of Russia’s Moscow division must be notified within three working days of the general meeting. The proposal was first made by Rosbank’s Board of Directors. Both banks belong to the French group Société Générale; according to the group’s report, its Russian assets – Rosbank, Bank Société Générale Vostok, Rusfinance Bank, and Delta Credit – were only a cause of ?35m

The Russian cosmetics manufacturer Concern Kalina now has new stockholders: HSBC Bank PLC, which used to own a 7.08% shareholding in the business, UniCredit Securities International Ltd, with its 8.72% shareholding, and UniCredit Bank Austria AG, whose shareholding amounted to 10.72%, are no longer the cosmetics company’s shareholders. In addition, Kalina Finance reduced its stake in the business from 12.72% down to 3.59% and Renaissance Securities (Cyprus) Limited reduced its share from 19.89% to 7.98%.

Nomos-Bank decided to raise the credit limit offered to ChTPZ Group and its daughter enterprises by 3.5bn RUR, that is, up to 10.37bn RUR. The company can now use the extended limit to enjoy a wide range of banking products such as the floating assets replenishment options, long-term loans, factoring transactions, and trade finance scheme. ‘The decision to raise the credit limit for the company stems from the bank’s high opinion of ChTPZ financial dynamics and its market position. What is more, our companies happen to be long-term partners, and ChTPZ has proved a dependable one,’ says Vice

It has been reported that CIS Holding’s heat and power generating companies produced 21.13bn kilowatt-hours of electric power and 49.65m gigacalories of heat in the first quarter of 2011. This is actually 0.6% and 3.2% less, respectively, than in the first quarter of 2010, as that particular period was extraordinarily cold The Urals-based heat and power networks produced 1,810,348,645 kilowatt-hours of electric power and 6,886,258 gigacalories of heat in the first quarter of 2011. This is less than the 7,197,543 gigacalories in the first months of 2010; the same is true of the electricity

According to a recent examination of its financial state, Uralfinprombank’s liabilities currently come to 3.1bn RUR, including 2.85bn RUR that the bank owes to its private customers by way of deposits. Now the bank’s own assets (excluding the possible loss reserves and the capital consumption) amount to 2.05bn RUR. 71% of Uralfinprombank’s assets is constituted by loans offered by the bank to private and business customers. A trustee in bankruptcy is currently trying to locate the debtors and determine their actual financial situation. According to the preliminary estimates available, the