UrBC, Yekaterinburg, October 11, 2010. The Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary of the Kingdom of Spain to Russia Juan Antonio March Pujol is going to visit Yekaterinburg for the first time on October 18, 2010. The Ambassador is expected to take part in a Spain-dedicated culture event coordinated by a local shopping center. In the course of one day, he is to meet some college students, community workers, and politicians as well as to do some sightseeing and attend a charity ball at Evropa Shopping Center. The Spanish official will arrive in the Urals’ capital in the evening of October

UrBC, Moscow, October 11, 2010. Russia’s Federal Financial Markets Service decided not to allow OAO Yamal Aviation Company based in Salekhard, Yamalo-Nenetkiy Autonomous Region, to go through with the launch and state registration of an extra issue of ordinary registered non-certificated shares.

UrBC, Yekaterinburg, October 11, 2010. The international rating agency promoted the long-term credit rating and the national scale rating of Surgut, a Russian city, from ВВ-/ruAA- to ВВ/ruAA, with Stable rating outlook. ‘The rating promotion results from the fact that we now give more favorable estimates to the city’s liquidity status, which, in its turn, has to do with our adopting a new methodology on rating the regional and municipal authorities,’ says Standard & Poor's credit analyst Karen Vartapetov. Standard & Poor's reports the rating is still badly affected by

Ural Airlines will now offer more flights from Yekaterinburg to Vnukovo Airport in Moscow to its customers. During the summer, this flight was only available once a week, every Friday. Starting October 14, 2010, the carrier’s planes will land in Vnukovo Airport three times a week: on Thursdays, Fridays, and Sundays. As a matter of fact, Ural Airlines is the only company to offer business class tickets on flights to Vnukovo.

The second tour of a special offer launched by VISA International is now closed. The offer, dubbed, ‘Try It – You’ll Like It’, means that eleven customers of METCOMBANK from Moscow, Yekaterinburg, Perm, Volgograd, and Kamensk-Uralskiy will receive 3,000 RUR each in the nearest future. The second tour of VISA’s prize-giving campaign was launched on July 1-August 31, 2010 and involved all the holders of METCOMBANK-issued cards who used their Visas to pay for products and services over the given time period. The amount of money spent was not a criterion.

A large exhibition facility will probably be put up in Sverdlovsk Region soon. The project is to be supervised by the Mid-Urals Development Corporation, Head of Sverdlovsk Region Government Anatoly Gredin announced at a press conference in Yekaterinburg. According to the official, INEXPO exhibition center might stop operating as a result. ‘There is plenty of space available at 145 Gromov St, but we do not like the idea of holding large-scale exhibitions there. The place will most likely become an innovational technologies museum targeted at a young audience. We are planning to spend about 30

Analysts from Sverdlovsk Region Hygiene & Epidemiology Center’s Consumer Rights Protection Department looked into the customer complaints they had been getting throughout the third quarter of 2010. The experts came to the conclusion that local organizations repeatedly violated consumer rights over this time period, the center’s press officer reports. As far as the banking market is concerned, most customer complaints have to do with OOO Home Credit & Finance Bank, OOO KB Renaissance Capital, and OOO Rusfinance Bank.

The net profit of OAO Zapsibcombank went down by 27.89 million RUR, or 41.1% in the third quarter of 2010, that is, from 67.891 million RUR in the second quarter of the year down to 40.001 million RUR in the third quarter. ‘The 41.1% decrease in Zapsibcombank’s net profits between the second and the third quarters of 2010 resulted from the changes in the tax legislation that came into effect recently; namely, these changes involve a lower limit on the debt interest that can be accounted for in tax relief procedures. This means the bank had to pay more taxes in the third quarter of the year,’

The value of Bank Severnaya Kazna’s assets (property of OAO Alfa-Bank) went down by 3,763,918,000 RUR or 22.12% in the third quarter of 2010, that is, from 17,015,220,000 RUR on July 1, 2010 down to 13,251,302,000 RUR on October 1, 2010. It has been reported that the drop in asset value had to with the cession of business customers’ debts and selling the bank’s realty.

Sverdlovsk Region Arbitration Court ruled on September 17, 2010 that Sredneuralsk Metallurgical Plant should undergo bankruptcy proceedings, which resolved case А60-18859/2010-С14 for the time being. The news was carried under Kommersant’s Insolvency Announcements heading. Viktor Maksimtsev from Region Self-Regulatory Organization of Trustees in Bankruptcy Non-Commercial Partnership was appointed the plant’s provisional trustee in bankruptcy. The court will consider the company’s bankruptcy case on December 13, 2010.

Sverdlovsk Region Arbitration Court is now considering the claim laid by OOO SU-26 Sverdlovskgrazhdanstroy against OAO Euro-Asian International Transportation & Logistics Center; the former insists that the Center be declared bankrupt. A hearing on the relevance of the plaintiff’s demands is to take place today. OAO Euro-Asian International Transportation & Logistics Center is believed to be one of Sverdlovsk Region’s largest logistics hubs. The investment project was designed by Deloitte & Touche Regional Consulting Services Limited, a consultancy.

Khanty-Mansiysk Autonomous Region Arbitration Court decided to put off the hearing of the claim laid by OAO Khanty-Mansiyskiy Bank against ZAO Yugra Investment & Construction Projects Management; the plaintiff insists on being paid 873.17 million RUR worth of debt, Interfax refers to the bank’s press officer as saying. ‘The court hearing did not take place, it has been postponed since the two parties agreed that Khanty-Mansiyskiy Bank would give the defendant a month to produce a paying-off schedule on the loan debt,’ the press service representative explained to Interfax. In case the

Sverdlovsk Region Arbitration Court declared OOO Alcomarket Magnum (69/1 Lenin St. Off 1, Yekaterinburg) insolvent, thus closing case А60-27020/2010-С14; the debtor now has to undergo bankruptcy proceedings. The news was carried under Kommersant’s Insolvency Announcements heading. Pavel Klementiev, a member of Razvitiye Self-Regulatory Organization of Trustees in Bankruptcy Non-Commercial Partnership, was appointed the store’s trustee in bankruptcy. Creditors’ claims get accepted till November 2, 2010. Magnum strong drinks chain store is the property of Omega Group, a well-known strong drinks

The Expert magazine came up with its annual rating of Russia’s Top 400 enterprises recently. Companies from all branches of industry are allowed to compete in the rating, so the final list comprises businesses from all the basic economic fields. As for the place a particular company was given, this was determined by the organizations’ sales output of products or services in the year 2009. If the nature of a certain business made it impossible to apply this criterion (as is the case with banks and insurance companies, for instance), the most economically equivalent financial report data were

Yekaterinburg Municipal Duma deputies considered Yekaterinburg State Property Management Committee’s report on the buildings and monuments on the city’s cultural heritage list at their latest committee meeting. During the meeting, the deputies expressed their concern over the protection of the buildings in question. For one, Deputy Eduard Romanovskiy mentioned a low-rise dwelling in Rosa Luxemburg St.: the structure had been pulled down by ZAO Metaline without any legitimate permission. Romanovskiy said the developer was never really punished. N. Grenaderova explained to those present at the

‘Our sales forecasts for the mobile phones market are over 32 million items in 2010 and about 35 million in 2011 provided that the average price stays the same or 36 million in case the cheaper segments grow more popular again. We might fully restore our pre-recession sales levels in 2012,’ Euroset’s report on trends on the Russian retail market of mobile phones and portable appliances in January-September 2010 says. According to the mobile phone chain’s report, some 22.4 million phones were sold on the Russian retail market in the nine months of this year; this figure was 24% more than that

Sverdlovsk Region Minister for Industry & Science Alexander Petrov came to OAO Pervouralsk New Pipe Plant on a working visit in order to check on Iron Ozone 32, an advanced electric furnace steel-making facility and one of the region’s strategically important investment projects to be launched this fall. ‘The significance of this investment project can hardly be overestimated. ChTPZ Group’s Iron Ozone 32 is the first mini-plant of such quality to be built in Russia or the CIS from scratch in the last decade. This is also Sverdlovsk Region’s grandest investment project for this year.

Sverdlovsk Region division of the Federal Migration Service inspected 236 buildings (including 158 residential buildings, 53 newly built housing blocks, 19 stores, and 6 other structures) in the first three days of its Operation Patent. The division’s press officer reports violations on the part of both the foreign workers and their employers were revealed as a result, and all the culprits had to face administrative prosecution. All in all, thirty-three foreign citizens were prosecuted under Article 18.8 of the Russian Federation Administrative Offense Code, twelve subjects were prosecuted

Tyumen Region Arbitration Court supported the ruling of Tyumen division of Russia’s Federal Antimonopoly Service which imposed a 3.58 million RUR fine on OAO GSK Yugoria. The insurance company was fined for colluding with Uniastrum Bank in order to limit the competition on the car insurance market. GSK Yugoria tried to contest the FAS’s verdict in court, claiming that it admitted a collusion attempt and had already canceled the corresponding agreement with the bank.

The Russian Federation Government introduced a set of measures to support the Russian provinces at the time of a financial downfall. However, this support is not a proof against the local authorities’ failures, the international rating agency Standard & Poor's says in its recent report: ‘The anti-recession measures taken by the government did improve the situation in the Russian regions, but did not prevent any future breakdowns.’ The analysts behind the report believe that these provincial breakdowns are actually not very likely to happen. Nevertheless, given the federal