Sky Express Airline flew 106,940 passengers in June 2009, which was 5% more than a year earlier. The company’s passenger turnover came to 156.97 million passenger-kilometers, while the passenger load coefficient reached 72.23%. As for the first half of the year 2009 altogether, the carrier serviced 429,412 passengers, which falls short of the figures for January-June 2008 by 88%.

Yekaterinburg-based Koltsovo International Airport serviced 914,841 passengers in the first half of 2009, which is 20.9% less than a year earlier. Besides, the passenger turnover dropped by 20.2% on domestic flights, with the figure coming to 572,974 people, and by 23.2% on international flights, with the figure coming to 273,951 people. Then, the number of passengers flying within the CIS decreased by 17.9% and only reached 67,916 people. The number of sorties went down by 19.1% compared with the first six months of 2008 and came to 6,450. Then, the airport processed 5,576.8 tons of mail,

Pipe Metallurgical Company (TMK) announced the results of its performance as of June 30, 2009. In the first half of the year, the company shipped 1,203 tons of steel pipes to consumers, which was 20% less than in the first half of 2008. TMK explained this was mainly due to the shrinking market. ‘The domestic market has reduced by 34.8% compared with a year earlier,’ the company reports. At the same time, TMK’s OCTG shipments (most of which consisted of weldless pipes) went up by 3% in the first half of 2009. The shipments of premium class threaded-joint casings increased as well. Then, the

‘We are rather worried about the fact that our foods are missing from large chain stores’ shelves. To enter these chains, one has to make enormous efforts, which largely means paying huge sums of money. However hard Confectionery Group SladCo might be trying to prove its great quality, it’s just impossible to enter these stores free of charge,’ Director of Confectionery Nadezhda Kharyuta said at the semiannual meeting of Yekaterinburg food manufacturers. ‘Our shelves are full of cheap Ukrainian sweets, whereas Kazakhstan, for instance, raised the customs duties on these items by up to 23%. To

UralBusinessConsulting Agency of Information and Analytics has been informed by Sverdlovsk Region’s Economic Offense Department that the accounts of a certain firm at Bank24.ru had been blocked in absolute accordance with the existing law; the action was taken in the course of an investigation related to money theft from a number of Yekaterinburg-based businesses. The Department claims a group of offenders was using a Trojan software program to steal some money from legal entities’ accounts; the money was then cashed after a series of several transferal transactions. The law-enforcement

Yekaterinburg’s Kirovskiy district court partially sustained the claim laid by Bank Severnaya Kazna (Alfa-Bank’s asset) former Counselor to Chairman of the Supervisory Board Evgeniy Parfenov regarding the arrears of wages and his severance deal, the spokesperson for Judge Anna Vassilyeva reports. A little earlier, the court also sustained the claim laid by the bank’s former Counselor to Chairman of the Supervisory Board Valeriy Malkov regarding his eighteen-million-ruble severance payment. In fact, Kirovskiy district court has had to handle similar claims laid by the bank’s First Deputy

‘Egorshinskiy radio plant currently employs about 1,300 people, with 61 million RUR worth of wage arrears, as far as the basic workers are concerned. As for the top managers, the enterprise owes them about 40 million RUR. There exists an official document describing the paying-off schedule,’ the plant’s BOD member Andrei Gerasimov announced at a press conference in Yekaterinburg. ‘On June 24, 2009, our GD Vitaliy Yelkin sent a letter to the plant’s stockholders informing them of the business’s possible bankruptcy. Under the law, if no action is taken within thirty days, he is to file a

The annual general meeting held at Ural Precision Alloys Plant (the asset of Novolipetsk Iron & Steel Works, NLMK) resulted in the decision not to pay the dividends on ordinary registered uncertified shares for the financial year 2008. The shareholders also elected the new BOD, consisting of five members, and approved of the annual report for 2008. As it happens, NLMK bought a 47.99% share in the plant’s authorized capital from Maxi Group at an auction in late June 2008.

Sverdlovsk Region Arbitration Court keeps looking into the claim laid by Apogei Metall Yekaterinburg against Ural Turbine Plant. The plaintiff insists on being paid 2,466,018.54 RUR for the products delivered, the contract penalty of 123,300.93 RUR for the period of August 27, 2008 to December 29, 2008, and the 969,701.2- RUR interest (VAT excluded) for the period of December 30, 2008 till the payoff date. The plaintiff took the case to court hoping the authorities would secure the claim by arresting the defendant’s cash assets, namely, 2,613,766.07 RUR (2,589,319.47 RUR which is the claim’s

Vladivostok Avia reduced the number of its Vladivostok-Moscow flights to one a week, the local booking offices report. The scheduled Moscow-Yekaterinburg flight was launched on June 1, 2008. The flight was operated on a daily basis (except for Wednesdays). The airline’s representation was introduced in Yekaterinburg last August, but they were unable to explain it to UrBC why the number of flights had been decreased.

The annual general meeting of Verkh-Isetskiy Metallurgical Plant (VIZ) shareholders resulted in the decision not to pay the dividends on ordinary registered uncertified and preference registered uncertified type A shares for the financial year 2008. In addition, the stockholders voted to elect the new Board of Directors, consisting of seven members. Then, they approved of he annual report for 2008 and of the income statement.

‘The increase in airport taxes and tariffs has to do with the need to keep the airport profitable under the current economic circumstances,’ Yekaterinburg-based Koltsovo Airport’s press officer reports. ‘The increase in prices (which complies with the Federal Tariff Service’s Order 107-т/4 as of June 3, 2009) won’t bring substantially bigger revenues, given the overall output downfall. Nevertheless, the new prices will partially make up for greater expenses related to improving the quality of passenger and airline service (such as introducing new buildings and machinery),’ the press officer

Sverdlovsk Region division of the Federal Antimonopoly Service (FAS) found KB Citibank guilty of violating the existing Russian advertising law, the spokesperson for the Service Marina Yusypova said to an UrBC reporter. Yusypova explained the advertising text messages the bank had been sending to its customers without the latter’s consent actually violated Article 18 (part 1) of the Federal Advertising Bill. Citibank was ordered to eliminate the violation.

UTair Airlines’ passenger turnover went down by .4% in the first quarter of 2009, the company’s press officer reports. At the same time, the mail and cargo turnovers dropped by 43.5% and 24.9%, respectively, while the accrued flying time shrank by 12.2%, the company reports. Still, in June 2009, the airline flew 337,559 passengers, which is actually 4.6% better than a year earlier.

The net profit of AKB Investbank plunged by 64,285,000 RUR, or 75.5% (from 85,202,000 RUR to 20,917,000) in the second quarter of 2009 compared with the first quarter of the year. The bank reports this has to do with the need to spend more on extensive network development.

Koltsovo Airport of Yekaterinburg is to raise the airport tax for airlines on July 21, 2009. According to the preliminary information available, this means the fee per passenger will go up 18%, the fee charged for taking off and landing services will rise 18.3%, the aviation safety tax will increase by 28.8%, and the fee per international flight passenger will rise by 19.8%. This means an average increase of 18% to 29% on all the basic tax items. In fact, the airport tax sum depends on the actual route of the carrier. The increase in taxes will lead to the airlines’ greater outgoings, which,

Bank24.ru (the asset of Probusinessbank and member of Life Group) has once again found itself in the middle of a customer-related scandal. A special message was posted on behalf of the bank’s customers on one of Yekaterinburg’s banking forums that actually accused the bank of blocking their legal entities accounts. The authors of the message don’t think it improbable that the bank might be involved in some dubious scheme. UralBusinessConsulting Agency of Information and Analytics quotes the message below: ‘Our company suffered last week due to these two banks’ actions that were both illegal

The international rating agency placed Probusinessbank’s (Life Group’s asset) long-term B- Issuer Default Rating and other ratings on its Rating Watch, with Negative rating outlook. ‘The fact that we gave their ratings Negative outlook stems from the increasingly weakening quality of Probusinessbank and its daughter banks’ assets and their limited ability to make up for the future losses with the help of their capitals. The bad debts (that is, the ones overdue by ninety days or more) are reported to make up 8.6% of Probusinessbank’s portfolio in May 2009. The regulatory capital sufficiency

The net profit of Bank Petrokommerz went down by 182,673,000 RUR, or 41.4% (from 441,681,000 RUR to 259,008,000 RUR) in the second quarter of 2009 compared with the first one. The bank says the drop in net profits has been caused by smaller net profits coming from foreign currency reserves and the need to create reserves for possible losses as well as to make greater advanced payments on profits tax.

‘Rusgrad has not been acting as the customer of Yekaterinburg’s Central Stadium reconstruction project since January 2009. Over 50% of all the jobs have been completed by now, with Sinara Group investing a total of 1.3 billion RUR into the project,’ Sinara Group’s PR center explained to an UrBC reporter. Meanwhile, Sverdlovsk Region Arbitration Court is looking into the claim laid by Rusgrad Construction Company against Central Stadium; the plaintiff wants to be paid over 23.72 million RUR. So far, it has been decided in the course of the preliminary hearing that the next meeting would take