October 9, 2012. Within the first three days of the Ural Bank for Reconstruction & Development (UBRD) offering its BO-1 bond issue at MICEX, investors have shown a lot of interests in the issue. For one, at least 20 transactions were landed every day during business hours on October 3,4, and 5, while the total number of transactions came to 68 and amounted to 147m RUR altogether. What is more, 10 transactions were landed within the negotiated deals mode and under the sale and repurchase agreements: these amounted to 389.5m RUR. ‘We feel that the investors’ great interest to this initial

October 9, 2012. Uralvagonzavod Scientific & Production Corporation’s parent company came up with a performance report for the nine months of 2012. The plant’s sales revenues reached 67.4bn RUR, which is 38.1% more than a year earlier (48.8bn RUR). The target figures for the year 2012 come to 92bn RUR, Uralvagonzavod’s press service reports. The company’s production output also rose by 14.7% in January-September 2012 in comparison with January-September 2011. In September 2012, the plant manufactured 2,350 carriages, including 1,800 open goods wagons, 530 cisterns, and 20 lumber trucks.

October 8, 2012. Reputation, a rating agency, gave OAO MegaFon AA(s) corporate social responsibility rating, which signifies the company’s high corporate social responsibility level and the efficiency of its strategy in this particular field, MegaFon’s press service reports. MegaFon’s rating, AA(s), means that the company has a working corporate social responsibility policy that is regulated by internal normative documents; that the company implements CSR projects within the core directions of its activity; that the interested parties get informed on all the relevant data; that the company’s

October 8, 2012. 155bn RUR were transferred to the Russian Federation budget from Sverdlovsk Region in the nine months of 2012; this is 11.3bn RUR more than in the nine months of 2011, Sverdlovsk Region division of the Federal Tax Service reports. Federal budget payments amounted to 43.7bn RUR worth of taxes, which exceeds the figures for a year earlier by 2.1bn RUR, or 5%. The VAT payments reached 37.9bn RUR, which is 18% more than in January-September 2011. Over the nine months of 2012, 3.2bn RUR worth of corporation tax was paid, which is 219.2m RUR, or 7% less than a year earlier. The

October 8, 2012. ChTPZ Group is planning to have its debt payments restructured for the period of up to seven years, the company’s financial expert Valery Lukin, who is currently working on the restructuring, told Prime. ‘A restructuring process normally involves the prolongation of a credit period for five to seven years, but every creditor is focused on their own priorities in this process. The main task is to reach a compromise that suits everyone,’ Lukin said. The company, which invested a lot of money in the construction of nationally important projects (Vysota 239 and Iron Ozone) in

October 8, 2012. ‘One of the main problems Sverdlovsk Region faces in the agro-industrial sector is the shortage of suitable storage facilities for the local farms. For one, cold storage facilities are very expensive,’ Sverdlovsk Region Minister for Agriculture & Industry Mikhail Kopytov said at a briefing. ‘The lack of cold storage facilities is particularly keenly felt in May and June of each year: this is exactly the reason why in these months, vegetables are imported in Sverdlovsk Region from the southern countries like the former Soviet republics,’ Kopytov said. Now in the Ural

October 8, 2012. Sverdlovsk Region Energy & Communal Housing Services Minister Nikolai Smirnov went to Kamyshlov on a business trip in order to look into how the industry-specific programs are being implemented, Sverdlovsk Region Press Service Administration reports. He paid special attention to the construction of the town’s first housing meant for relocating residents from slums: this program is being implemented with support from the Communal Housing Reform Facilitation Fund. Kamyshlov Council reports that about 140 buildings have been declared unfit for living in. The program on

October 4, 2012. About 40% of salaried employees based in Ural Federal District work in the conditions that fail to meet the sanitary and hygienic requirements, which means the number of industrial accidents and breakdowns remains high, Deputy Plenipotentiary Representative of Russian Federation President in Ural Federal District Andrei Kolyadin said at a recent meeting. ‘The State Labor Inspection must put its foot down. Given the circumstances, our trade unions and organizations could be more active. The trade unions would contribute significantly to improving the situation around

October 4, 2012. Sverdlovsk Region Government signed a memorandum on selling Verkhnyaya Sinyachikha-based subsidiary of OOO NIGMAS (Verkhnyaya Sinyachikha Metallurgical Plant, VSMZ) and Alapayevsk Metallurgical Plant, Sverdlovsk Region Government’s Press Service Administration reports. ‘We have reached a preliminary agreement on selling two plants: Alapayevsk Metallurgical Plant and Verkhnyaya Sinyachikha Metallurgical Plant. At the moment, the potential buyer is working on the legal details with OOO Volga-Sar, Bank Petrokommerz, and OAO Novaem,’ says the region’s Vice Premier Alexander

October 4, 2012. The Ural Bank for Reconstruction & Development’s BO-1 Series bonds (total value 2bn RUR) hit the stock market yesterday, October 2. The bonds were quoted at 100% of their face value. The issuer promised to pay 12.5% a year during the first and second coupon periods (per-bond profit being 62.33 RUR); after the second coupon period expires, an offer can be made by the bank, the UBRD’s press service reports. The bids for the bonds could be submitted on October 24-28, 2012 in the book-building mode. The issue was under-written by Uralsib Finance Company and Rosselkhozbank.

October 4, 2012. An official delegation from Byelorussia’s Polotsk visited the town of Polevskoy, Sverdlovsk Region; as a result, a cooperation agreement was signed, Russian Copper Company’s press service reports. One of the main points on the Byelorussian delegation’s agenda was visiting Uralgidromed (a part of Russian Copper Company). The visitors also had a look at Gumeshevskoye deposit that was first mentioned in writing as early as in Pavel Bazhov’s tales and at the mineral collection (the Copper Mountain Treasures); they also paid a visit to Russia’s only production facility that

October 4, 2012. Uralvagonzavod (UVZ) Scientific & Production Corporation and Bombardier presented their innovative technologies at the 2nd Eurasian Exhibition/Congress ExpoCityTrans-2012 that opened in Moscow on October 2. The UVZ Corporation and the world’s largest machine-building corporation’s joint stand, dubbed ‘City Transport of the Future’, featured a sample of a full-size driver’s pit of a low-floor tram Bombardier Flexity as well as small copies of underground carriages and other tram types. Experts and visitors to the fair could also enjoy a presentation of UVZ-designed

October 3, 2012. Ten workers of OOO Chelyabinsk Tractor Plant, who are now retired, were awarded the titles of Honorary Long-Service Employees; this decision was made by the plant’s Director-General and Trade Union Committee, Uralvagonzavod Corporation’s press service reports. This was done on the company’s Long-Service Employees’ Day. This year’s award was given in the special anniversary year: the plant’s Long-Service Employees’ Council turned 35. The Council is headed by Honorary Citizen of Chelyabinsk, the USSR State Prize laureate, and the plant’s former head Nikolai Lozhchenko. The

October 3, 2012. The parent enterprise of UVZ Scientific & Production Corporation, Uralvagonzavod won in the annual regional Best Taxpayer of 2011 contest. The winner’s diploma, signed by Sverdlovsk Region Government’s Prime Minister Denis Pasler, says that Uralvagonzavod was given the award ‘for its great contribution to the development and retention of Sverdlovsk Region’s wealth and for great production performance in 2011’, UVZ Corporation’s press service reports. The annual Best Taxpayer of the Year contest is held in order to build on the social weight of the region’s best taxpayers

October 3, 2012. Starting from 2013, Sverdlovsk Region is going to subsidize its industrial and agricultural SMEs in order to compensate for the expenses occasioned by investing in energy efficiency and production upgrades, Sverdlovsk Region’s Press Service Administration reports. The mechanisms that could support the SMEs in local industry and agriculture were discussed at Sverdlovsk Region Government’s meeting today. The main report was given by the region’s Economics Minister Dmitri Nozhenko. He said that nearly 202,000 small and medium enterprises were operating in Sverdlovsk Region at

October 3, 2012. Pipe Metallurgical Company (TMK), one of the world’s largest OCTG producers, reports it has launched an R&D center in Houston, Texas, U.S.A., the company’s press service reports. The opening ceremony was attended by TMK management and the American division of TMK IPSCO as well as the representatives of the State of Texas and Houston town council, the Russian Consul-General in Houston, TMK goods consumers from the energy sector, and the American local and national media representatives. The attendees looked at the new center’s main divisions, including the SEM lab with its

October 3, 2012. Sberbank increased its car loan rates for both ruble and foreign currency loans by 0.5% recently, Banki.ru reports. ‘The changes also affected the parameters that influence the loan cost: whereas earlier the rate used to depend on the vehicle type, now it only depends on the down payment and the loan period,’ says Banki.ru’s loan products expert Yelena Sudarikova. The ruble loans are now offered at 15.5% to 17% a year rather than 15% to 16.5% a year. The interest rates for the dollar and euro loans range between 12.5% and 14% a year rather than 12% to 13.5% a year.

October 2, 2012. A reading of Efim Nisenbaum’s book called It’s All Over the Hill Now took place at Uralvagonzavod Scientific & Production Corporation’s company museum. The book was published by the company to celebrate the 50th anniversary of the locally famous Nizhniy Tagil-based propaganda theater Torch and the 80th birthday of the theater founder and the book’s author, the corporation’s press service reports. Efim Nisenbaum was the theater’s heart, its founder, its script writer, its director, and its actor, while Torch was a visible cultural event in the life of the enterprise and

October 2, 2012. 54 former employees of Verkhnyaya Sinyachikha subsidiary of OOO NIGMAS resumed their hunger strike on Monday, a representative of their initiative team Andrei Zhukov told Interfax-Ural. ‘The hunger-strikers’ main requirement is to get their compensations for August and September 2012 for being made redundant. The debt currently amounts to 5.5m RUR,’ Zhukov said. It was reported earlier that on June 22, eighteen former workers went on hunger strike because of arrears of wages. On June 28, the hunger strike stopped, since the employees were paid 584,000 RUR (nearly the entire

October 2, 2012. Ural Mining & Metallurgical Company (UMMC) feels it is only expedient to develop Yelkinskoye and Yelanskoye, the copper and nickel deposits in Voronezh Region, if the survey results indicate they contain at least 500,000 tons of S1-S2 category nickel, Prime refers to UMMC Holding Director-General Andrei Kozytsin as saying to reporters. At the end of May 2012, Rosnedra’s tender committee declared UMMC the winner of the tender entitling the company to the development of the said deposits. The Russian Federation Government confirmed the tender results in July, allowing OOO