Governor of Sverdlovsk Region Eduard Rossel took a pre-election leave until November 30, 2007. The decision had to be taken due to the Governor’s taking part in the State Duma elections. Head of Sverdlovsk Region Government Viktor Koksharov is going to be acting Governor for the time being.

SKB-Bank, one of Russia’s largest provincial banks and a major player on the Ural market, celebrated its 17th anniversary on November 2, 2007. The bank was founded on the basis of Sverdlovsk Region branch of Agroprombank on November 2, 1990. It has been Sverdlovsk Region Government’s authorized bank since February 1996. In 2001, SKB-Bank found a valuable strategic partner in Sinara Group; in 2007, the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development became one of SKB-Bank’s shareholders. The volume of SKB-Bank’s assets rose from 2.6 billion RUR in 2002 to over 28 billion RUR in 2007; its loan

'A lawsuit against UralTransBank and Bank Severnaya Kazna regarding violation of antimonopoly laws has been filed and is soon to be processed in court. We are now busy collecting all the papers needed for the case. Should we need some more documents, there will probably emerge a court’s ruling suggesting that the two banks in question provide them,’ Deputy Head of Federal Antimonopoly Service’s Sverdlovsk Region division Sergey Volkov said to UrBC. The Service first took legal action against two Yekaterinburg-based banks in October 2007. UralTransBank and Severnaya Kazna were suspected

'The potential of AMUR car factory’s project related to assembling of ten- and twenty-ton dumpers is hard to gauge yet. We have to wait till we see at least one truck made by the factory before talking of the future of the project,’ the spokesperson for GAZ Group (the holding AMUR car factory is part of) said to a UrBC reporter. The factory is planning to assemble ten- and twenty-ton dumpers supplied by FAW, a Chinese enterprise. The project has been estimated to require $1m worth of investments. Some experts believe AMUR won’t be able to win any share of the Russian truck and dumper

According to the Expert Ural magazine (Vol. 40 (303)), Ural Treasures Bank was rated the Urals’ 16th largest bank in terms of asset volume in the first half of 2007: the bank’s assets amounted to 8,156 million RUR on July 1, 2007. It was also declared 20th largest bank in terms of ATM cash turnover, which means the bank was nicely promoted from the 11th position it was given in July 2006. In addition, Ural Treasures Bank became the Urals’ 25th largest bank in terms of business loan portfolio, 14th largest bank in terms of securities portfolio, 12th largest bank in terms of the volume of

Central Bank of Russia reports volume of loans given by TyumenEnergoBank to for-profit self-regulatory organizations for up to 30 days went down by 59.1% (from 96.789 million RUR to 39.58 million RUR) in January-October 2007.

Volume of Concern Kalina’s net profit went down by 10% in January-September 2007 compared to a year earlier. The company’s net profit dropped from 372,581,000 RUR in January-September 2006 to 336,093,000 RUR (or by 36,448,000 RUR) in nine months of 2007.

'Rosaviation had every reason to impose sanctions on air carriers whose charter flights are delayed on regular basis. There is simply no other way to make these airlines take their contractual obligations seriously,’ Director of Inna Tour Travel Agency Inna Averyanova said to UrBC. Rosaviation’s sanctions touched upon the carriers whose charter flights kept getting delayed en masse during the summer period; the number of flights these companies were allowed to operate in the winter season was cut by 20%. VIM Avia, it turns out, was one of the unfortunate airlines. Ms Averyanova feels

The value of net assets of Energy - Mixed Investments (the unit investment trust) managed by Eurogreen Management Company Ltd. went down by 6.71% between October 29, 2007 and October 30, 2007. According to Eurogreen’s website, the company’s net assets decreased from 4,427,022.51 RUR on October 29, 2007 to 4,130,034.41 RUR on October 30, 2007.

Central Bank of Russia reports volume of loans given by VUZ Bank to for-profit self-regulatory organizations for up to 30 days went down by 96.65% (from 31.268 million RUR to 1.048 million RUR) in January-October 2007.

Sredneuralsky Copper Smelting Plant reports its net loss rose by 818.4% in July-September 2007; the company’s net loss went up from 19.66 million RUR in the second quarter of 2007 to 160.901 million RUR, or by 141.241 million RUR, in the third quarter of the year.

Chelyabinsk Iron & Steel Works (part of Mechel Group) reports its net profit dropped by over 10% in the third quarter of 2007. Their net profit went down from 2,099,440,000 RUR in April-June 2007 to 1,598,043,000 RUR in July-September 2007, which means it decreased by 501,397,000 RUR, or by 23.9%. This can be explained by a decrease in metal product prices and an increase in the prime cost per one manufactured item.

A press conference on the bank’s new developmental stages organized by URSA Bank’s top management and the bank’s business partners was held in Interfax’s press center. It was announced that Russia New Growth Fund managed by Troika Capital Partners (TCP) had bought URSA Bank’s shareholding consisting of 7.4% of the bank’s ordinary shares acquired from S.M. Capital Group. ‘Troika Dialog was the first investment company to start doing business with URSA Bank long before other investors first heard of this provincial bank. Today, URSA Bank is one of Russia’s most successful banks,’ Troika

Asha Metallurgical Works reports its profit dropped by over 10% in the third quarter of 2007. The company’s net profit decreased from 506,739,648 RUR in April-June 2007 to 219,174,150 RUR in July-September 2007, which means profits went down by 287,564,498 RUR, or by 56.7%. This had to do with smaller sales revenues and prime cost growth. The company’s sales revenues dropped by 6.4% due to smaller production output and lower transfer prices. The prime cost of the company’s products rose by 10.7% due to raw materials becoming more expensive and due to a number of overhauls conducted by the

Central Bank of Russia reports volume of loans given by Snezhinskiy Bank to sole traders despite overdraft went down by 17% (from 540,000 RUR to 449,000 RUR) in January-September 2007.

Avtostrada Corporation Ltd set up an official subsidiary in Novosibirsk that will offer its services to customers from Novosibirsk, Omsk, Tomsk, and Kemerov Regions as well as to people living in Altai and Krasnoyarsk Territories. The introduction of the new branch was part of the company’s geographical growth and subsidiary network expansion program targeted at making the business as customer-friendly as possible. ‘Avtostrada broke into the Siberian market in April 2007, and six months was enough for us to understand that setting up a subsidiary would probably be a good idea, as it can both

The Expert Ural magazine came up with the rating of the Ural Region’s banks; four banks from Tyumen Region, three banks based in Sverdlovsk Region, and three Chelyabinsk Region banks filled the top ten positions. SKB-Bank was rated as the region’s most successful bank in terms of asset growth; the volume of the bank’s assets amounted to more than 24.1 billion RUR on July 1, 2007, which is 25% better than three months earlier, the magazine observes. SKB-Bank was also named the Urals’ No.1 in terms of consumer loan portfolio growth (the increase reached 43% over just three months) as well as in

UC RUSAL is going to spend $1.4bn on its seven-year environmental protection program. 'All of UC RUSAL’s member companies are to get $1.4bn each; besides, we are planning on cutting the amount of harmful emissions by 1.5 times by 2015,’ the company’s International Projects Director Alexander Livshits announced after signing a protocol on cooperation with the United Nations. UC RUSAL exports its produce to seventy different countries and is responsible for 12.5% of the global aluminum output and for 16% of the global production of alumina.

‘Nizhneserginskiy Hardware Plant (part of Maxi Group) might actually have to close down due to lack of working assets,’ Maxi Group’s PR Director Alexander Popov said to UrBC. Maxi Group CEO Nikolai Maximov has already applied to Russian President Vladimir Putin for state support, since the company owes some 38 billion RUR to about fifty banks, whereas the banks themselves refuse to go for refinancing because of a recent financial crisis in the U.S. Mr. Maximov says Maxi Group has to spend all of its working assets on debt payments, which has been affecting their production quite badly (that

'I am very dissatisfied with both Sverdlovsk Region Railways’ investment plan and its current condition,’ Governor of Sverdlovsk Region Eduard Rossel said at a press conference on October 31, 2007. The Governor feels the problem needs to be solved in the nearest possible future, as poor railways are hindering the region’s economic development. 'We have to be dealing with the railway issues faster than with the economic ones,’ he observed.