‘The purchase and sale agreement that involves 75,000 of Sverdlovsk Gubernskiy Bank’s ordinary registered uncertificated shares (the bank’s additional share issue aimed at improving on their authorized capital) is illegal, since it contradicts the existing legislation regarding the joint stock companies. This agreement violates the priority of the federal bills, so the court must consider the public prosecution authorities’ claims, given particularly the fact that due to the general drift to a stronger legal framework much more attention is now paid to the infringement of state interests,’

‘Russian private banking market has been developing quite rapidly lately, but this is mainly due to Moscow that has always been in control of the majority of Russian VIP customers,’ the Russian Academy of Public Service under the President of the Russian Federation’s leading expert Alexei Gusev announced in the course of the 3d All-Russian Private Banking/Russia 2008 conference in Yekaterinburg. Alexei Gusev believes regional private banking is not available to customers at the moment, as no large banks are willing to work in provinces. ‘Quite ironically, the country’s major banks have been

Central Bank of Russia reports volume of for-profit self-regulatory organizations’ deposits in Sverdlovsk Gubernskiy Bank valid for 91 to 180 days went down by 18.33% (from 60.002 million RUR to 49.002 million RUR) in January-April 2008.

The agenda of this year’s Cannes film festival included United Vodka tasting contest as usual. This is Europe’s largest and most prestigious contest founded by United Vodka & Spirits association in Belgium in 2000. The contest aims to unite vodka and strong drink manufacturers in their efforts to promote their best brands on the new markets. Over 600 vodka brands take part in the event every year. This year’s event was attended by companies from Belgium, Germany, Sweden, France, Russia, Ukraine and many other countries. Some old-time vodka technologists as well as young experts and the

‘The talks about the need to increase the recovery amount for people with bank deposits come in good time and sound like a good idea. The European banks, for instance, pay their depositors about ?20,000 in case of an insured event. The sum proposed for Russian banks, that is, 600,000 RUR, approaches this standard quite closely. On average, people have been depositing much more money in the banks lately compared to a few years ago, so raising the recovery amount for their deposits seems logical,’ SKB-Bank’s Deposit Operations Director Denis Belogurov said to UrBC. The idea to raise the sum

Yekaterinburg is currently hosting the 3d All-Russian Private Banking/Russia 2008 conference. ‘We hope that the conference will give a chance to all the participants to get the answers to their questions and to find solutions to all the problems that hinder private banking development in this country at the moment,’ Chair of Ural Banking Union Valentina Muranova said at the opening ceremony. The conference began with reports made by the Russian Academy of Public Service under the President of the Russian Federation’s leading expert Alexei Gusev, Estonia-based Sampo Bank’s Senior Investment

Central Bank of Russia reports volume of for-profit self-regulatory organizations’ deposits in Perviy Respublikanskiy Bank valid for 1 to 3 years went down by 78.47% (from 16.514 million RUR to 3.554 million RUR) in January-April 2008.

The construction of a business center and a mall in Koltsovskiy highway, Yekaterinburg, still hasn’t begun. In the meantime, these buildings are part of the preparation program for the next year’s Shanghai Cooperation Organization summit in Yekaterinburg. Point & Co’s First Deputy GD Yuri Tsepernyat explained in the course of a meeting at Sverdlovsk Region’s government house that they were currently busy re-designing the buildings. ‘We had to do this because of the local farmers. We did manage to buy a few nearby land allocations and turn them into two four-hectare construction sites, but

‘Renova-StroyGroup’s Academic construction project can serve as a paragon of professionalism for all the other builders,’ Governor of Sverdlovsk Region Eduard Rossel said in the course of a meeting at Sverdlovsk Region’s government house on May 28, 2008. During the meeting, the Governor was shown some real-time video broadcasts from the construction site. According to the project manager Stanislav Pridvizhkin, everything is being put up in accordance with the schedule. Eduard Rossel suggested that the region’s Construction Minister Alexander Karlov should coordinate a professional development

The construction of Antey Trade Center’s third section (a forty-five-storey building in Krasnoarmeyskaya-Malyshev St. in Yekaterinburg) has been halted once again. Antey’s Director Andrei Gavrilovskiy reported in the course of a meeting at Sverdlovsk Region’s government house that the trade center’s management had been trying in vain to get the lease agreement approved of by the region’s authorities for forty-five days already. Prior to this, Ural Federal District’s division of Rostechnadzor (the state environmental, technological, and nuclear safety watchdog) inspected the construction site

Demidov Business Center is being put up in one of Yekaterinburg’s streets in full accordance with the schedule; however, a number of problems have recently made the process more complicated, Director of KlaasStroy Mars Sharafulin announced in the course of a meeting at Sverdlovsk Region’s government house. The business center in question is one of the buildings that have to be completed by the beginning of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization summit that is to take place in Yekaterinburg next year. Mars Sharafulin reports Yekaterinburg transport and traffic committee is not prepared to

According to the Central Bank of Russia, volume of private individuals’ deposits in Uralfinance Bank valid for 181 days to 1 year went down by 25.4% (from 340.664 million RUR to 254.134 million RUR) in January-April 2008.

Central Bank of Russia reports volume of for-profit self-regulatory organizations’ deposits in UralTransBank valid for 181 days to 1 year went down by 48.76% (from 119.922 million RUR to 61.446 million RUR) in January-April 2008.

‘Deposit Clearing Company (DCC) is one of this company’s large nominee shareholders that takes part in RTS trading,’ says Accord Invest’s Deputy GD Konstantin Selyanin. The stock of ordinary shares of Urals Interregional Network Company (MRSK) owned by Deposit and Corporate Technologies has recently dropped from 100% to 51.51%, while DCC acquired a 31.7924% shareholding on May 26, 2008. ‘It’s obvious, though, that in this case it’s not DCC that owns these 31.7924% of MRSK’s shares, these are some other entities, probably the management or key stockholders of MRSK itself. At the same time, DCC

According to the Federal State Statistics Service’s regional division, Sverdlovsk Region’s industrial production index for the first four months of 2008 exceeded the figures for January-April 2007 by 7.1%, while the producer price index for commodity goods and the consumer price index went up by 14.1% and 7.5%, respectively, compared to a year earlier.

Central Bank of Russia reports volume of loans given by Khanty-Mansiyskiy Autonomous Bank to sole traders for 91 to 180 days decreased by 25.46% (from 32.779 million RUR to 24.433 million RUR) in January-April 2008.

‘Uralmash Machine-Building Corporation and Uralmash Drilling Equipment are two different enterprises. The latter is not Uralmashzavod’s legal representative and is not empowered to represent the plant on the drilling equipment market. This is why Uralmashzavod cannot be held responsible for Uralmash Drilling Equipment’s performance, its terms of delivery and the quality of its products,’ the spokesperson for Uralmash Machine-Building Corporation said to UrBC. ‘Uralmash Machine-Building Corporation was set up a year ago on the basis of two large enterprises: Uralmashzavod and ORMETO-YUMZ Heavy

The estimated value of share of BCS – Metallurgical Fund (the unit investment trust run by BCS Management Company) went down by 2.46%, dropping from 1,514.31 RUR on May 22, 2008 to 1,477.13 RUR on May 23, 2008. At the same time, the unit’s net assets decreased by 2.44%.

SKB-Bank’s Board of Directors decided to set up a number of representations in Irkutsk, Krasnoyarsk, Nizhniy Novgorod, Ufa, Novokuznetsk, and Lipetsk.

Russian Transport 2008, the international forum, was held in Sochi on May 22-24, 2008. Ural Airlines’ General Director Sergey Skuratov took part in the event. The forum was dedicated to the country’s transport’s development directions, new transport projects, and analysis of current problems, the airline’s press officer reports. Head of the Federal Air Transport Agency Evgeniy Bachurin said in the course of the forum that their branch was developing rather rapidly at the moment, despite certain problems and the need to introduce more domestic flights and upgrade the aircraft. The forum