Ural Treasures Bank won two awards at a quality festival dedicated to banks’ lending practices and savings offers for private individuals. The event was coordinated by Quality Guarantee and Yekaterinburg Consumer Rights Committee, with some ten local banks competing in five different categories, namely: -the best consumer loan offer; -the best mortgage offer; -the best short-term savings offer; -the best medium-term savings offer; -the best long-term savings offer. Ural Treasures Bank presented three of its programs (Express Cash via Card, its mortgage lending scheme, and Vertical Success

‘The reasons for recent changes in the shares Uralfinprombank’s stockholders have in the bank’s authorized capital may vary. On the one hand, the bank proprietor might have decided to take a part of the money out of business to employ it elsewhere. On the other hand, this shuffling may have to do with some earlier agreements with the bank’s top executives: they might, for example, have a buying option and be thus encouraged to promote the business further,’ analyst of Finam Investment Bank Vladimir Sergievskiy said to UrBC. Anatoliy Pavlov decreased his share in Uralfinprombank’s authorized

The balance sheet total of Sberbank’s Ural branch rose by 47 billion RUR, or 14%, in the first quarter of 2008. The volume of the bank’s net assets has increased by 10% since the beginning of the year and reached 309 billion RUR on April 1, 2008. In addition, the bank’s net assets came to 2.5 billion RUR in January-March 2008, which is 1.7 times better than a year earlier. Sberbank’s Ural branch was able to improve on the lending and investment-collecting volumes as well. The bank’s loan portfolio, for instance, reached 275.8 billion RUR on April 1, 2008, loans to individuals went up by 7.2%

‘The official reason for Uralsevergas to apply for a loan with the Bank of Moscow was the need to build up on the company’s working assets,’ says the spokesperson for Uralsevergas (ITERA O& G Company’s daughter enterprise) Oleg Vlasov. The Bank of Moscow agreed to lend the company 400 million RUR for a term of eighteen months, the bank’s press officer reports. ‘Given the debts Uralsevergas failed to collect from Sverdlovsk Region’s consumers, the sum will probably be used to pay ITERA for the natural gas supplied. We need the loan to be able to get gas in the quantities we need and to get

The recent unlawful strike at Severouralsk bauxite mine (aka SUBR) is over now and all of the enterprise’s five mines are operating as usual, UC RUSAL’s press officer said to UrBC. ‘After we negotiated on meeting the terms of the Collective agreement and looked into ways of rising the pay through more effective management and enhanced labor productivity, all our employees resumed working,’ the company representative said. ‘Some parties and organizations’ strike-related proclamations are only a publicity stunt that has nothing to do with SUBR whatsoever,’ UC RUSAL reported.

According to the Central Bank of Russia, volume of loans given by UralTransBank to state-run for-profit organizations for 181 days to 1 year went down by 76.13% (from 1.466 million RUR to 350,000 RUR) in January-March 2008.

Central Bank of Russia reports volume of loans given by SberInvestBank to nongovernmental financial institutions for 1 to 3 years went down by 21.44% (from 20.8 million RUR to 15.775 million RUR) in January-March 2008.

Three Russian banks have finally merged with Kaliningrad-based Investbank (registration number 107); these are: Moscow-based Conversbank (registration number 122), Voronezh-based Voronezhprombank (registration number 562), and Yekaterinburg-based GRAN Commercial Bank (registration number 1125). The Central Bank of Russia has officially confirmed these banks’ liquidation and annulled GRAN Bank’s registration through order 2083900013041 on April 15, 2008.

Sverdlovsk Region Court of Arbitration will have to handle three cases on April 22, 2008: А60-5012/08 (plaintiff: the regional hygiene and epidemiology center; defendant: Yekaterinburg’s meatpacking plant), А60-221/08 (plaintiff: Rosgosstrakh-Ural; defendant: GAMMA Insurance Company, Severnaya Kazna Insurance Company), and А60-3990/08 (plaintiff: the region’s prosecution authorities; defendants: Sverdlovsk Region Ministry of State Property Management and Sverdlovsk Gubernskiy Bank).

Central Bank of Russia reports volume of loans given by Pervouralsk Joint Stock Commercial Bank to private individuals for 181 days to 1 year went down by 38.34% (from 30.327 million RUR to 18.7 million RUR) in January-March 2008.

The All-Russian Consumer Rights Protection Society coordinated a number of Quality Contests on the food market. The contests are aimed at checking the food manufacturers’ compliance with the governmental standards and selecting a winner, the so-called quality leader, in every market segment. The fist such contest has been held among vodka brands. ‘The contest is targeted at encouraging producers to compete for brand leadership and improve on quality. Strong drinks are one of the food market’s most challenging products, this is why we started with them,’ says the Society Chairman Mikhail

One of Yekaterinburg’s major developers started selling apartments in the seventh building of Sozvezdiye apartment block on April 21, 2008. Sozvezdiye is one the best places to buy a home in as far as the western end of the city is concerned. The total area of all the eight buildings within a block comes to over 80,000 square meters; the place is conveniently located along Fuchik St., Belinskiy St, and Tchaikovsky St. next to Dirigible mall, some kindergartens, a school, and an amusement park. Besides, the block is architecturally appealing and can boast nice apartment layouts, a spacious

ALNAS (known as ALNZ at RTS exchange and part of ChTPZ Group) set up a new maintenance shop for electric-centrifugal pump units in Buguruslan, Orenburg Region. This shop is to become a part of the company’s maintenance center, originally established in 2005 and servicing 1,200 oil wells (belonging to Orenburgneft, Saratovneftegas, SANEKO, and some others) at the moment, ChTPZ Group’s press officer reports. ‘ALNAS is planning to expand the range of services it offers to oil companies through introducing a full range of oil well services such as supervising of wells, maintaining the producing

‘A fire broke out on fifty square meters of one of the rooms at INEXPO exhibition center on April 19, 2008. The case is now being investigated by the authorities and it’s hard to say when the inquest is going to be over; however, the first preliminary data on what caused the fire and on the damage done might be available tomorrow afternoon,’ Sverdlovsk Region’s division of the Ministry of Emergencies reports. On the night of the accident, a drum’n’bass festival was taking place on the premises of the center; after the fire broke out, some 5,000 people had to be evacuated; the fire is reported

Central Bank of Russia reports volume of loans given by Khanty-Mansiyskiy Bank to for-profit self-regulatory organizations for 31 to 90 days went down by 94.01% (from 1.036 billion RUR to 62.121 million RUR) in January-March 2008.

The Ural Bank for Reconstruction and Development keeps implementing its strategy of making financial services available within a stone’s throw of any customer through expanding its subsidiary network. This means the number of customers, offices, and hi-tech products used keeps growing as well. Therefore the bank is increasingly focused on improving its IT resources. At the same time, the company is intent on providing its customers with the best service, making it as speedy as the customers would like it to be, and this is where reliable and advanced technology is a must. This is why the Ural

URSA Bank was able to win the 6th IT Leader National Prize in the Commercial Bank category. The bank’s Managing Director Sergey Shuvalov received the diploma commemorating the company’s significant contribution to IT development in Russia and a special badge of merit in the course of a solemn awarding ceremony in Moscow. The annual IT Leader Prize is given to companies and their IT directors in order to bring their IT achievements into the limelight. To win the prize, a company has to come up with really innovational IT solutions, show particular progress in IT development, and prove its IT

Central Bank of Russia reports volume of loans given by Tagilbank to private individuals for 181 days to 1 year went down by 12.04% (from 16.3 million RUR to 14.337 million RUR) in January-March 2008.

Ural Turbine Plant presented a first-ever film about the company and a number of new products at Russia Power exhibition. The film acquaints the viewers with all the main production shops, the company’s engineering center, and the steam turbines that are currently employed at Novo-Sverdlovskaya power station, the companys press officer informed UrBC. According to the plant’s press officer, the company also exhibited the new makes of steam turbines for combined-cycle plants. One such turbine is meant for combined-cycle plant 410 located at the power station in Krasnodar; it will be connected

Pipe Metallurgical Company’s PR Department came up with the results of the company’s activity in the first quarter of 2008. The enterprise shipped 207,000 tons of tubes and pipes with varying diameters to consumers in January-March 2008; this falls short of the figures for the first quarter of 2007 by 8%, while the amount of oil country tubular goods shipped and the Russian market’s demand for the tubes decreased by 6% and 8.5%, respectively. The spokesperson for the company reports the transactions on the domestic market are on the decrease due to the need for large-diameter pipes becoming