UrBC, Moscow, March 14, 2011. The tour operator Eurotours and their office in Moscow are now longer doing business together, the company’s official website says. ‘The three years’ work of the Moscow office has produced results that everyone can’t help noticing. Our team introduced the new group tours that enjoy great popularity with tourists. We intend to fulfill all our obligations related to the trips already booked in the usual mode,’ says Eurotours division General Manager Tatiana Davydova. ‘The entire Moscow office is moving on to bigger and better things. We are about to start our work

UrBC, Yekaterinburg, March 14, 2011. The bad debts made up 4.97% of Sberbank’s lending portfolio in January- February 2011, which was 0.07% less than before, the bank’s report (compiled in accordance with the Russian Accounting Standards) says. The loan reserves came to 655bn RUR on March 1, 2011.

UrBC, Yekaterinburg, March 14, 2011. A cooperation agreement between Sverdlovsk Region Federation of Trade Unions and the Confederation of Trade Unions of Azerbaijan will be signed in Yekaterinburg on March 16, 2011. The signing is part of the International Labor Organization workshop dedicated to cooperation between the two trade unions in the field of migrant workers’ rights protection. The workshop is mainly aimed at enhancing the efficiency of the migrant workers’ protection against their foreign employers and at increasing the economic effect of labor migration. The representatives of

UrBC, Yekaterinburg, March 14, 2011. Increasingly more members of Omega Group Holding are going bankrupt due to their inability to pay off loans to Sberbank of Russia. Sverdlovsk Region Arbitration Court declared OOO Omega Group Vostok and OOO Omega Group Tyumen insolvent. Vadim Permikin and Alexei Sergeyev of Razvitie Non-Commercial Partnership of Self-Regulatory Trustees in Bankruptcy were appointed the two companies’ trustees in bankruptcy. According to the court files, Omega Group Tyumen owes Sberbank 1.13bn RUR on guarantor’s contracts, whereas Omega Group Vostok (with OOO Omega Spirits

UrBC, Yekaterinburg, March 14, 2011. The earthquake in Japan has had an immediate impact on the global economy. Following the news of the earthquake and the subsequent tsunami the Japanese stock market went dramatically down, while the Nikkei 225 decreased by 6.25%. The calamity affected the foreign exchange market as well, since the news of the catastrophe urged the yen holders to sell out, which resulted in the yen weakening against the most important currencies. The analysts report, however, that the yen regained its positions and even grew stronger very soon. OOO Bank Koltso Urala’s

UrBC, Moscow, March 11, 2011. Lev Khasis, who ran X5 Retail Group for five years, is now leaving the business. The company’s Supervisory Board has already accepted the CEO’s resignation. The company reports Lev Khasis intends to work on some projects of his own; his deputy Andrei Gusev will be appointed the company’s new CEO. ‘I decided to devote myself to other business projects, but I am still a loyal customer and a stockholder,’ Molly.ru quotes Lev Khasis as saying.

UrBC, Moscow, March 11, 2011. Russia’s Federal Financial Markets Service refused to approve of the internal rules of ZAO Surgutneftegazbank, OAO Olimp, an investment company, and OAO Severo-Invest, another investment and finance company based in Nizhnevartovsk; the refusal is aimed at counteracting money-laundering of criminal proceeds as well as at counteracting the financing of terrorist activity.

UrBC, Yekaterinburg, March 11, 2011. Yekaterinburg-based Koltsovo Airport rendered its services to 175,280 people in February 2011, which exceeded the figure for a year earlier by 13.3%. This figure comprises 115,230 people who flew domestically (an 18.1% increase compared with February 2010), 14,310 people whose destinations were located within the Commonwealth of Independent States (a 64.2% increase against a year earlier), and 45,720 international passengers, which was 5.7% less than in February 2010 because all the Egypt-bound flights were called off. As far as the international flights

UrBC, Yekaterinburg, March 11, 2011. Tyumen Central District court sustained the claim laid by the public prosecution authorities against OAO Uralsvyazinform and OAO Ural-TransTelecCom and ruled that the telecommunications providers in question must limit Internet access to a presumably terrorism-oriented online resource. The recent inspections revealed that the citizens of Tyumen Region had unlimited access to a website that justified the actions of the international terrorist organization Hizb ut-Tahrir al-Islami and encouraged its readers to establish an Islamic state, the caliphate, in

UrBC, Moscow, March 11, 2011. Starting July 2011, Rosaviation intends to suggest that air carriers stop using Tu 154 airplanes unless these aircraft have all their design defects fixed, head of Rosaviation Alexander Neradko announced at the agency’s final meeting on Friday, RIA Novosti reports. ‘Rosaviation has by now imposed additional requirements on both the designers and manufactures of Tu 154 M to make sure the design is improved and a special compulsory application bulletin is issued,’ Neradko said. According to the official, no design improvements or upgrades have been developed for

OAO Alfa-Bank, the proprietor of OAO Bank Severnaya Kazna, announced the sale of the bank’s remaining assets. As Bank Severnaya Kazna no longer operates under the name, the company’s furniture, safety vaults, office equipment and tills are now offered for sale, 3,550 items altogether. The company is asking 2.92 million RUR for the property in question, while the posted balance sheet value comes to 17.85 million. All the items are now located in a warehouse in Yekaterinburg. It is suggested that the customers pick them up themselves, with the minimum purchase requirement of 50,000 RUR.

France’s trade mission UBIFRANCE officially opened in Yekaterinburg recently. This is the organization’s third Russian office after the ones in Moscow and Saint Petersburg. UBIFRANCE is a state-run organization in charge of industrial and commercial issues. The decision to set up an office in Yekaterinburg was taken in 2010. According to the French officials, this decision was actually influenced by considerations of the Urals’ economic potential. For one, Sverdlovsk Region and France’s trade turnover reached $780m last year, which was 73% better than a year earlier. France is now the

Russia’s Federal Antimonopoly Service might investigate the advertising campaign launched by ZAO Bank Tinkoff. The new video clip features the TV news presenter Arina Sharapova, Interfax refers to the bank’s Vice President for Marketing Oleg Anisimov as saying. The advertisement was broadcast both on television and via the Itnernet; the video starts with a cue from ‘Sberbank’s customer’, a woman climbing the stairs who complains to the news presenter about her worries: ‘It’s always really busy at Sberbank,’ she laments. Arina Sharapova replies by telling her about the loan offers available at

Starting May 18, 2011, OAO Ural Airlines will be operating a scheduled international flight from Yekaterinburg, Russia to Kiev, Ukraine, and back. The flights will be operated on a weekly basis, that is, every Wednesday, using an A 320 airplane.

Starting April 29, 2011, OAO Ural Airlines is going to operate a scheduled international flight from Novosibirsk, Russia, to Larnaka, Cyprus, and back. The flight will be operated once a week, every Friday, using an A 320 airbus. The cheapest tickets are available at ?699 plus fuel fees. The flight to Larnaka is, in fact, Ural Airlines’ first international flight departing from Novosibirsk.

Magnitogorsk Iron & Steel Works (MMK) announced it had bought a 50% minus one share holding in MMK-Atakas. The transaction amounted to $485m, the company reports. This means MMK can consolidate a 100% shareholding in the company now. The deal will be through by November 1, 2011. The obligatory prerequisite for the transaction is getting all the necessary permits first. ‘Consolidating a 100% share in MMK-Atakas is part of MMK’s strategy aimed at securing our presence of the sprawling markets in Russia and the Middle East, primarily Turkey. This will make running the company even more

MMK-Atakas, a joint venture of Magnitogorsk Iron & Steel Works (MMK) and Atakas Group launched its electric steel-smelting facility in Iskenderun, Turkey in the course of a ceremony attended by Turkey’s President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan. ‘The launch of the department means MMK-Atakas in Iskenderun is actually complete. The metal goods output is expected to reach over 800,000 tons this year already, whereas in 2012, it will come to over 2 million tons. The facility’s production capacity is estimated at 2.3 million tons of ready goods annually,’ MMK reports. The decision to build MMK-Atakas

The analytical center Expert-Ural came up with its traditional rating of the Ural Region-based banks, with data for the start of 2011. SKB-Bank was featured among the leaders in all the ratings, becoming Sverdlovsk Region’s largest organization in terms of asset volume (88.8bn RUR) and Ural Federal District’s second largest bank. The bank was also Ural Federal District’s largest in terms of lending portfolio volume (49.4bn RUR) and proved No. 1 in terms of loans offered to private individuals (the total volume amounted to 24.4bn RUR). As it happens, SKB-Bank managed to raise the volume of

OOO Bank Koltso Urala’s business customers can now feel more comfortable doing business in Asia as the bank now offers them the possibility of transactions involving the Japanese yen and the Chinese yuan. ‘We offer our customers an opportunity open a bank account in Japanese yens or Chinese yuans, which will make it easier to do business and will speed our customers’ transactions with their contractors,’ says the bank’s representative Igor Nikulin.

The personnel and customers of MEGA shopping center in Yekaterinburg had to leave the building following a message that a bomb had been left on the premises. The shopping mall’s press center informed the reporters that a team of miners has already arrived at the scene to look for explosives. MEGA in Yekaterinburg hosts IKEA, Auchan, and OBI hypermarkets.