UC RUSAL and ONEKSIM Group signed an agreement regarding the acquisition of 25% and one share of Norilsk Nickel that currently belong to ONEKSIM, whereas ONEKSIM is going to get 11% of UC RUSAL’s shares and some financial remuneration. Besides, ONEKSIM is going to become one of UC RUSAL’s BOD members, UC RUSAL’s press officer said to UrBC. 'We see this as a strategically important deal that will serve as a springboard for the creation of a diversified mining and metallurgical corporation in Russia. UC RUSAL has already used its competitive advantages to build a powerful platform that

Another stock market workshop took place in the Ural Bank for Reconstruction and Development’s Investment Center. This time, the workshop was devoted to private finances management (from savings to investments) and was targeted at putting the attendees in the picture of how stock market investments are different and why they are better than the traditional savings techniques. Irina Yakhontova from the bank’s Investment Services made a report on investing in securities and precious metals and tried to give her audience a clear-cut idea as to the stock market mechanisms and criteria one should

Central Bank of Russia reports volume of loans given by UralFinPromBank to natural persons for 91 to 180 days went down by 80.58% (from 4.311 million RUR to 837,000 RUR) in January-October 2007.

Novolipetsk Integrated Metallurgical Complex (NLMK) reports it is currently negotiating with Maxi Group in order to possibly buy the company’s controlling shareholding. The two parties involved have so far reached a preliminary agreement regarding the potential sale. The transaction is still to be further negotiated upon, approved of by the purchasing enterprise’s BOD and shareholders, and will probably have been completed by the end of 2007.

Sverdlovsk Region’s division of Federal Antimonopoly Service says Aviaprad has violated the current advertising law, the spokesperson for the Service reports. Among Aviaprad’s faults are failing to provide the Service with copies of advertising aids, which is why the carrier was accused of violating the Federal Advertising Law. This bill states that all the promotional materials or their copies as well as all the changes made to them and all the agreements related to design, implementation, placement, and distribution of ads must be kept in a company’s archives for twelve months after the ads

Central Bank of Russia reports volume of call loans given by VUZ Bank to natural persons went down by 34.13% (from 14.683 million RUR to 9.671 million RUR) in January-October 2007.

Magnitogorsk Iron & Steel Works (MMK) is about to reach its maximum production output ever this year, the company’s Chairman Viktor Rashnikov announced at a trade union meeting. MMK is now the world’s twentieth largest steelmaking enterprise and Russia’s No. 1. MMK produced 11.046 million tons of steel in January-October 2007, which exceeds the figures for a year earlier by 771,700 tons. The company expects to make 12.2 million tons of steel by the end of 2007. Mr. Rashnikov also commented on the company’s successful IPO at London Stock Exchange and the launch of a number of large-scale

According to the Central Bank of Russia, volume of call loans given by VUZ-Bank to natural persons went down by 34.13% (from 14.683m RUR to 9.671m RUR) in January-October 2007.

Nizhniy Tagil Iron & Steel Works’ radiation safety service is going to celebrate its 25th anniversary this year. Over the last 25 years, the service believes it has managed to detect and remove 517 radiation sources. Their actions resulted in cancellation of the already scheduled assembling of 212 heightened danger devices and disposal of 305 batches of radioactive materials, the spokesperson for Evraz Group said to UrBC. The plant’s radiation safety service has received governmental accreditation by now; its laboratory consists of 26 unique pieces of equipment that make it possible to

Central Bank of Russia reports volume of loans given by Sverdlovsk Gubernskiy bank to for-profit self-regulatory organizations for 1 to 3 years went down by 12.27% (from 1,066,036,000 RUR to 935,240,000 RUR) in January-October 2007.

Within the ten months of 2007, the return of duties to Sverdlovsk Region’s consolidated budget exceeded the corresponding figures for the previous year by 28%, the spokesperson for the Governor reports. In January-October 2007, the return of duties came to 84,75,700 RUR, whereas in 2006, the figure only amounted to 65,889,000 RUR. The spokesperson indicated a considerable rate of tax proceeds growth for a number of taxes, including the company income tax (an increase of 28.7% against the same figures for the previous year), the graduated personal tax (an increase of 32.8%), the lump-sum tax

According to the Central Bank of Russia, the volume of loans given by TyumenEnergoBank to non-profit non-governmental organizations for 91 to 180 days went down by 100% (from .5m RUR to 0 RUR) in January-October 2007.

On November 23, 2007 the Bank of Russia registered the US dollar exchange rate at the level of 23.42 RUR per one US dollar. This is the lowest US dollar rate recorded since August 1999. On the contrary, the rate of the European currency tends to exceed its own peak values, and its rate on November 23, 2007 amounted to 36.09 RUR per Euro. The crumbling of the US dollar rate causes no boom over the exchange offices. However, the Bank of Russia’s reports show that in 2007, the monthly amounts of US dollars sold by natural persons were always higher than the volumes of US dollars bought by them.

Yekaterinburg Customs processed 52,000 cargo manifests related to export and import of goods in January-October 2007, which exceeds the figures for a year earlier by 10.6%. 1,700 legal entities were involved in foreign trade turnover, the spokesperson for Ural Customs Administration reports. The volume of customs duties that are to be directed to the federal budget outstripped the initially planned amount by 3.44%. The budget was given 8.456 billion RUR, which is 1.764 billion RUR better than in January-October 2006. The foreign trade turnover in Yekaterinburg Customs zone reached $6.2bn in

'In January 2008, nearly all the strong drinks sold in Russia are bound to grow more than 5% pricier due to freight expenses going up,’ Galion’s Sales Director Alexander Luchnikov said to UrBC. Mr. Luchnikov says both automobile and railway transportation fares are always on the rise, so the players on the strong drinks market just have to up their prices

Sverdlovsk Region’s division of the State Employment Service reports the number of gainfully occupied people in the region came to 2,422,000 on October 1, 2007, with 3.2% of wage and salary earners employed within the agricultural, forestry, and hunting sector, 2.8% employed within the mining industry, 14.9% employed within the manufacturing activity sector, 10.5% employed within metallurgical industry sector, 3.3% are busy making machinery and equipment (excluding weaponry and ammunition), 3.8% are employed in the electricity, natural gas, and water production and distribution sector, 6.3%

Ural Federal District’s division of the Ministry of Internal Affairs completed the investigation of a criminal case that involved a group of raiders guilty of stealing assets of Bogdanovich Porcelain Works. It was revealed in the course of the inquiry that the company’s CFO (who was part of a criminal group) stole some 24 million RUR belonging to the plant and transferred the money into a fictitious firm’s bank account, allegedly as a way of paying for the newest equipment which, in fact, was nothing but scrap metal. This resulted in an overwhelming decrease in the volume of the company’s

Magnitogorsk Iron & Steel Works (MMK) is going to launch its large family aid program in January 2008. The program aims to improve the living standards and health of the company’s employees as well as their social status and prestige and thus make having many children more popular. The company currently has data on 281 large families, and the program is to cover families with three or more children under the age of eighteen, provided the employees have no bad disciplinary records. It covers social aid, healthcare, education, and sports through things like monthly allowances, birthday

Central Bank of Russia reports volume of loans given by AGROPROMBANK Credit to sole traders for 1 to 3 years went down by 41.43% (from 44.2 million RUR to 25.89 million RUR) in January-October 2007.

UC RUSAL has been making presentations on its new website on aluminum (www.aluminiumleader.com) in towns and cities of Sverdlovsk Region lately. Two such presentations took place in Ural State Technical University and in Ural State University of Mines. Students were thus able to learn about the scientists who discovered aluminum and thought up a way to use it for industrial purposes as well as about the aluminum production process and the fields of its application. The presentations were followed by short documentaries about the future of the Earth and a discussion devoted to the global metal