Governor of Chelyabinsk Region Petr Sumin suggested in the course of President Dmitriy Medvedev’s meeting with Ural Federal District’s Governors that a so-called infrastructure decade should be proclaimed and implemented in the country. ‘I believe that it behooves the government at the time of a crisis to focus its economic efforts on the total reconstruction of our road and transport infrastructure and the building industry. The infrastructure decade would be of paramount importance,’ he said. The Governor also said that Chelyabinsk Region’s strategic development needed some powerful backup

Magnitogorsk Iron & Steel Works (MMK) has successfully undergone the environmental management audit procedure aimed at checking the system’s compliance with the ISO 14001-2004 international standards. The audit was carried out by Germany-based TUV NORD CERT GmbH. The procedure involved sixteen production departments, with both directors and employees showing a lot of improvements, meeting all the environmental goals for 2008, and exposing good skills of using the environmental management system in process control. TUV NORD CERT’s experts came to the conclusion that MMK’s environmental

Seven Ural Federal District-based banks were featured in RBC.Rating’s list of the country’s top hundred largest banks in terms of net asset volume in January-September 2008. Three of these banks are located in Tyumen Region, another three – in Sverdlovsk Region, and one bank is based in Chelyabinsk Region. SKB-Bank was given the 72nd position in the rating. RBC.Rating’s analysts report the bank’s net asset volume had come to more than 36.901 billion RUR by September 2008, which was 29% better than at the beginning of the year. The figure also secured SKB-Bank’s three-point promotion in the

A Bracker hydraulic press meant for testing pipes under pressure has recently been upgraded at Pervouralsk New Pipe Plant’s OCTG shop. The upgrading program included the installation of the new hydraulic power station and the replacement of the high-pressure units in order to avoid any hydraulic impact during the test hydraulic impacting process and to make the machinery more effective and reliable. The upgrading means the pressure can be made higher for the testing, which, in its turn, will result in a wider range of tubular products the plant will be able to offer its customers. The

Bank Monetniy Dom (formerly known as Mechel-Bank) reports its CONTACT money orders are now available from Finland. The international system’s outlets were introduced in Helsinki at the end of November 2008, with over 5,900 new access points launched all over the world since the beginning of the year. ‘CONTACT is becoming increasingly popular both in Russia and abroad, so the list of cities where the service is available keeps getting longer. For one, the system’s 2,800 new outlets were introduced in 500 more cities between September 15, 2008 and November 30, 2008. Most of these were set up in

Business customers opened 1,460 accounts in SKB-Bank in November 2008, whereas a month earlier, 1,118 accounts were opened, and 761 accounts were set up in September 2008. ‘This record actually fits the pattern of the general trend. We get more new customers every month, and almost every opening of a bank account is accompanied by an e-banking agreement. This means we get more than new accounts, what we get is the new economically active customers,’ says SKB-Bank’s Business Development Director Evgeniy Pavlov. The bank executive reports the customers are attracted to SKB-Bank because it keeps

Alfa-Bank sustained 7.96 billion RUR worth of losses in November 2008, Vedomosti reports. At the same time, the figure came to 103.7 million RUR in October 2008. Alfa-Bank bought Bank Severnaya Kazna’s controlling shareholding on November 30, 2008, which is to result in loss of independence by the latter. An Alfa-Bank representative quoted by the newspaper explained that the decrease in profits had to do with having to build up on the lending portfolio reserves and to reassess the cost of the business’s securities.

Ural Airlines has recently introduced a passenger support service. Any of the company’s customers can call 8-800-2000-262 to find out about the timetable and pricing policies, book tickets or order extra services as well as learn about any other flight-related issues. ‘Ural Airlines’ call center has acquired both a new name and more skilled personnel. All the calls are now handled by experts who undergo continuous training, while the passenger support service is targeted at dealing with each caller individually. This means that, whatever his or her problem, every passenger is sure to get a

Bank24.ru came up with its financial recovery plan, the bank’s official website reports. ‘Things have by now become smooth again. Bank24.ru is busy implementing a whole range of financial recovery measures,’ the bank says. Bank24.ru’s website says the agreement to this extent was signed by Deposit Insurance Agency, Probusinessbank (Life Group’s leading bank), and Bank24.ru on December 4, 2008. According to the terms of this agreement, Bank24.ru’s financial recovery is to be handled by Probusinessbank. According to their action plan, the bank’s management expects all of the bank’s services to

‘The first prize in our Gold Deposit business customer offer comes to 104,290 RUR at the moment. This is the cost of the gold accumulated since the beginning of the special offer’s term. The weight of the prize keeps growing, and so does the number of business who chose to work with the Ural Bank for Reconstruction and Development,’ the spokesperson for the bank said to an UrBC reporter. ‘Gold will keep adding up until December 29, 2008. The prize will thus keep being accumulated from November 24, 2008 to December 29, 2008. The weight of the gold prize depends on the number of accounts opened

Bank Severnaya Kazna reports that no interest will be paid on the settlement account balance beginning from December 18, 2008.

Ural Airlines is going to reduce the fuel fees for a number of international flights on January 11, 2009. For one, fees will go down for Yekaterinburg-Munich, Yekaterinburg-Paris, and Yekaterinburg-Prague flights. The fees for Yekaterinburg-Munich and Yekaterinburg-Paris flights will be halved and will thus come to only ?50. The fee for the Prague-bound flight will go down by ?25 and will thus amount to ?45. This isn’t the first time the airline has reduced its fuel fees, actually. In addition to the latest discounts, Ural Airlines kept decreasing the fuel fees for its chartered flights,

Webscan Technologies published the findings of its research on the brands most frequently referred to or mentioned in the Web’s Russian-speaking segment. According to the company’s data, allusions to 960 banks located in sixty different countries were tracked on over 3,700 online newswires, while the Top 100 most frequently mentioned banks’ rating was compiled on the basis of data supplied by Webscan N&P between January 1, 2008 and November 30, 2008. The rating carried the names of large foreign and federal banks as well as a number of provincial ones, with SKB-Bank getting the 48th

Fitch и Moody's report URSA Bank’s Rating Outlooks have been promoted due to the stockholders’ decision to unite in a holding with MDM-Bank, the bank’s press officer reports. Fitch affirmed the bank’s short-term Issuer Default Rating at B+ and gave it a Rating Watch Positive. The agency reports the proposed merger will enable the two banks to build up on their strengths in the business and retail market segments as well as to open up a whole range of brand new advantages through expanded customer base, greater size, and more pronounced risk diversification. Moody's has also affirmed

Deposit Insurance Agency, the state corporation, reports a general agreement has been signed by the agency, Bank24.ru, and Probusinessbank regarding the terms and the order of the three parties’ interaction in the course of Bank24.ru’s financial recovery. The agreement states that Probusinessbank, the investor, is to buy enough shares of Bank24.ru to be able to do the necessary decision-making. At the same time, the investor is to fully meet its obligations as to Bank24.ru’s financial recovery and thus to restore the bank’s financial development indicators to the level required by the Bank of

One accident occurred at the local railways between November 28, 2008 and December 5, 2008, the spokesperson for the Federal Transport Surveillance Service reports. A group of eight loaded wagons that had been detached and left unhooked on the connecting line started running off the track and collided with an oil locomotive at Sverdlovsk Region Railways’ Nizhneserginskaya station at 2.30 PM on December 3, 2008. The shunting master, who was located in the front of the group, was hurt badly and died in hospital. The case is currently under investigation.

‘URSA Bank and MDM-Bank’s principal shareholders talk the same language and aim to make the new holding Russia’s leading private bank. This is why coming to an agreement was easy enough. It became clear early in the negotiation process that our goals coincide,’ URSA Bank’s BOD Chairman Igor Kim announced at a press conference in Novosibirsk. Igor Kim feels this is an unprecedented deal scale-wise. ‘This is something yet unique to Russia’s banking system. The impact made by the current crisis can be seen as not being very significant, since the merger talks started as early as a year ago, and

According to Standard & Poor's, Sverdlovsk Region is currently one of Russia’s most industrially advanced regions (its foreign currency liability rating is ВВВ+/Negative/А-2; its national currency liability rating is А-/Negative/А-2; its national scale rating is ruAAA). ‘The rating growth is hindered by the lack of flexibility and predictability of the budgetary expenses and revenues. Then, the tax revenues might drop due to the slowing down of the economic growth rate over the next few years and the remaining pressure of the current expenditures and the dire need for capital

SKB-Bank offered its customers a new deposit type known as Patriot. The uniqueness of the new product lies in the combination of great profitability with a shorter than usual deposit period, the bank’s press officer reports. The deposit period only comes to a swift one hundred days, while the annual interest rate comes to 16.01% for ruble deposits. One has to deposit at least 10,000 RUR, $300, or ?300 (for foreign currency deposits, the interest rates come to 10% a year). In addition, all of SKB-Bank’s customers who open the Patriot deposit type at the bank will get a chance to win UAZ

Bank24.ru got a new set of shareholders in the early antemeridian hours of December 5, 2008, the bank’s official website reports. 20% of shares now belong to Probusinessbank, 19.565% of shares are now owned by Probusinessbank’s IT Director Alexei Pirogov, 19.969% of shares belong to Probusinessbank’s Vice President for Credit Risks Yaroslav Alekseev, 20% belong to Porbusinessbank’s Vice President Sergey Letunov, and the remaining 20% belong to Porbusinessbank’s Vice President Konstantin Martemyanov. Bank24.ru’s website says the agreement to this extent was signed by Deposit Insurance Agency,