Insurance company Busin (Kyiv) has collected UAH 293.238 mln of gross premiums in 2023, that is by 10.63% less than a year earlier, the rating agency Standard-Rating reported in the information on updating the credit rating/rating of financial stability of the insurer at the level of “uaAA+” on the national scale on the basis of the analysis of its statements for the specified period.
According to the report, receipts from individuals for this period have grown by 7,19% – to UAH 1,446 mln, and from reinsurers, on the contrary, have decreased by 7,39% – to UAH 43,182 mln.
Insurance payments sent to reinsurers for 2023 decreased by 10.62% compared to 2022 – to UAH 193.951 million. Despite such decrease, the ratio of reinsurers’ participation in insurance premiums remained almost unchanged – at the level of 66.14%.
Net premiums for the year decreased by 10.65% – to UAH 99.287 mln, while earned premiums increased by 30.89% – to UAH 114.479 mln.
For 2023, the company paid UAH 1,317 mln of insurance payments and indemnities to its clients, which is 91,70% more than for 2022. Thus, the level of payments has increased by 0,24 p.p. – to 0,45%.
The financial result from operating activity of IC “Busin” for 2023 has grown to UAH 65,143 mln, and net profit has amounted to UAH 55,218 mln.
Assets of the insurer on January 1, 2024 have decreased by 4,04% – to UAH 586,909 mln, shareholders’ equity has increased by 20,88% – to UAH 243,016 mln, liabilities have decreased by 16,25% – to UAH 343,893 mln, cash and cash equivalents have increased by 25,97% – to UAH 265,873 mln.
According to the information provided by RA IC “Busin”, as of January 1, 2024 has complied with the criteria of liquidity, profitability and quality of insurer assets, solvency and capital adequacy norms, riskiness norms of operations and asset quality norms.
IC Busin was registered in February, 1993. It specializes on risky types of insurance. It is a member of a number of professional and branch associations – League of Insurance Organizations of Ukraine, National Club of Insurance Payouts, International Association of Aviation Insurers (UA), Nuclear Insurance Pool, American Chamber in Ukraine, British Business Club.
Payment system NovaPay remained the leader in transfers of funds within the country by system in 2023, but the share of transfers made through it again decreased – to 32% from 35% at the end of the first half of 2023 and 45% for May-December 2022, according to the data of the National Bank of Ukraine (NBU)
Payment system Moneycom LLC “Swift Garant” for the year increased its market share to 17.57% from 2.51% in May-December 2022, jumping from seventh place in the ranking to second place, which was previously occupied by the payment system LEO, whose registration was revoked by the NBU in March last year.
In the second half of 2023, Moneycom also surpassed Financial World Ukrainian Payment System LLC, increasing its market share by 5.2 percentage points.
PrivatBank’s PrivatMoney moved from sixth to third place in the ranking, with its market share increasing from 2.61% in 2022 to 15.98% by the end of 2023. In particular, PrivatMoney’s market share increased by 10.3 p. p. in the second half of last year. This allowed the payment systems City 24 FC Phoenix, Financial World and Postal Transfer of Ukrposhta JSC, whose registration was revoked by the National Bank in the second half of 2023, to be ahead of the payment systems City 24 FC Phoenix, Financial World and Postal Transfer of Ukrposhta JSC.
As a result, “Financial World” for the year fell in the rating from the third place to the fourth, although its share increased from 12.72% to 15.00% (with a slight decrease of 0.6 p.p. in the second half of the year).
Rounding out the top five with 5.35% is Platiservice payment system of the same name LLC, which jumped from eighth place in the ranking in 2022 (1.74%). The company managed to bypass City 24 FC Phoenix, which took the seventh position with a share of 4.16% in 2023, positioned between Postal Transfer (5.34%) and LEO (1.48%).
In terms of participants, the share of NovaPay decreased to 32.23% (from 45.46% in 2022 and 35.58% in the first half of 2023), from fifth to second position went Swift Guarant, whose share increased from 3.79% to 20.66%, from fourth to third – FC Kontraktovy Dom with an increase in share from 9.92% to 13.06%, from sixth to fourth – PrivatBank with an increase in share from 2.61% to 12.36%. Ukrposhta with 5.35% (12.22%), which was second a year earlier, rounds out the top five.
According to the NBU, 844.55 million domestic transfers worth UAH 728.01 billion (or $19.9 billion in equivalent) were made in 2023, the average amount of one transfer within Ukraine amounted to UAH 862. For comparison for May-December 2022 transfers were 446.35 million for 292.6 billion UAH.
It is indicated that as of January 1 of this year, activities in the country were carried out by 35 systems of funds transfer, of which – 26 resident and nine non-resident.
Ukraine’s public debt to GDP ratio from 2009 to 2023 (UAH mln)
Source: Open4Business.com.ua and experts.news
Components of residential and commercial real estate maintenance services in Ukraine have gone up to 20% since the beginning of the war, said Ivan Petyukh, head of R-Class integrated real estate management platform.
“Consumables have risen in price by up to 20%, the cost of maintenance of engineering systems (by licensed third-party companies) by an estimated 10%,” he said.
The main challenges facing the R-Class in 2022-23 include. Petyukh singled out unforeseen disruptions in the supply of electricity, heat and water. In this regard, he said, the company is paying systematic attention to improving energy efficiency and energy independence. In addition to insulation of facades, R-Class specialists ensured and organized uninterrupted power supply of the objects by means of redundancy of electric capacities from different connection lines from the city, installation of additional diesel generators (capacity from 15 to 160 kW), installation of uninterrupted power supply sources (capacity from 12 kW); implemented a backup water supply/water drainage system.
The head of R-Class also noted that the introduction of the latest technologies helps to optimize utility costs and increase the service life of buildings. According to him, automated heat consumption systems that distribute the heat carrier depending on the current demands of the consumer and the outside air temperature, air recovery system, automatic gas analysis system in the parking premises that switches on/off the supply and exhaust ventilation depending on the air pollution, the latest air conditioning systems (VRV systems) that allow heating the premises at the outside temperature down to -15 in addition to the conventional water system allow saving energy resources.
R-Class’ integrated real estate management and development platform, which has been operating on the market since 2008, serves more than 300 thousand square meters of real estate. Among the objects are BC HILLFORT, BC Mikhailovskaya 7, Residential Complex “Pokrovsky Posad”, Residential Complex “Nobel” and others.
Polish protesters plan to resume blocking trucks in the direction of the checkpoint “Korchova-Krakovec” from March 13, the State Border Guard Service of Ukraine (SBGS) reports. “On March 13, protesters plan to resume blocking trucks in the direction of the checkpoint “Korchova-Krakovets”,” the State Border Service said in a message in the Telegram channel on Monday.
The message also states that from today from “9.00 protesters will not let trucks through the checkpoint “Ugrinov” in the direction of Poland. At the exit from Poland will be allowed 4 trucks every hour”. Earlier this was reported by the speaker of the state Border service Andrey Demchenko on the air of the national telethon.
“In the direction of checkpoints “Dorogusk-Yagodin”, “Zosin-Ustilug”, “Dolgobichiv-Ugrinov”, “Hrebene – Rava-Russkaya”, “Medica-Shegini” restriction of movement for cargo vehicles continues”, – noted in the message of the state Border service.
“The movement of passenger vehicles and buses in all directions is not limited”, – stated in the message.
As reported with reference to Demchenko, on the night of March 8-9 Polish farmers stopped blocking the direction through the checkpoint “Korchova-Krakovets”, and on it since then significantly increased the load, there also formed queues. “Over these last days we see the intensity of traffic exactly at this checkpoint… That is, the intensity there is quite high with the possibility of crossing the border in both directions. But, of course, and in this direction the queue remains: as of this morning it is about 600 trucks,” – said Demchenko.
The Antimonopoly Committee of Ukraine (AMCU) has identified grounds for banning the acquisition of control over lifecell group by French billionaire Xavier Niel’s DVL Telecom, a member of NJJ group.
In particular, the antitrust agency believes that it is necessary to check the relationship of control of lifecell itself and the parent company Turkcell with the person to whom the decision of the national security and defense Council of Ukraine applied personal special economic and other restrictive measures (sanctions).
“When considering applications for the acquisition of control over the group “Lifecell” by the company “DVL Telecom” arose the need to verify the relationship of control of the participants of the concentration, in particular the group “Lifecell” and the group “Turkcell” with the person to whom the personal special economic and other restrictive measures (sanctions) applied by the decision of the National Security and Defense Council of Ukraine,” – said the press service of the AMCU on Monday.
The report states that, having considered the applications on the acquisition of control by DVL Telecom over Lifecell LLC, Global Bilgi LLC and Ukrtauer LLC (lifecell group), the AMCU has identified grounds for banning the said concentrations.
“Given that the concentrations in the form of acquisition by DVL Telecom of control over Lifecell LLC, Ukrtauer LLC and Global Bilgi LLC constitute a single transaction and will take place under a single sale and purchase agreement, a separate authorization for DVL Telecom’s acquisition of control over Global Bilgi LLC cannot be granted by the Committee either,” the AMCU notes.
Considering the above, on March 7, 2024, the Committee again started consideration of the concentration cases in the form of acquisition by DVL Telecom of control over Lifesell, Global Bilgi and Ukrtauer LLC. At the same time began consideration of the case on concerted actions, which are directly related to the implementation of these concentrations, specified in the press service.
Earlier it was reported that at the meeting on March 7 AMCU allowed DVL Telecom to acquire control over Datagroup Holding Limited (“Datagroup-Volya”). In addition, the antimonopoly agency allowed concerted actions between NJJ UPAM (Paris, France), Lorimer II Ventures Limited (Nicosia, Cyprus), DVL Telecom (Paris, France) and a natural person – citizen of Ukraine in the form of implementation of provisions on refraining from competition, provided by Section 19 of the shareholders’ agreement, which will be concluded between these entities for a period of five years.
On December 29, 2023, Turkcell, a Turkish company, signed an agreement to transfer 100% of the shares, as well as all rights and debts of Lifecell LLC (TM lifecell), Ukraine’s third largest mobile operator, including contact center outsourcing company Global Bilgi LLC and tower rental service provider Ukrtauer LLC, to the French investment company NJJ Capital.
The decision to sign the agreement was made by the Board of Directors on December 20, but as early as May 9 it decided not to disclose information about the possible deal. Turkcell specified that the nominal price of Lifesell shares is UAH 12 billion 711.849 million, Global Bilgi – UAH 47.226 million and Ukrtauer – UAH 1 billion 964.04 million.
Authorized representatives of NJJ Capital (Paris, France) and Global Bilgi LLC (Kyiv, Ukraine) applied to the Antimonopoly Committee (AMCU) for authorization of NJJ Capital to indirectly acquire a part in the authorized capital of Global Bilgi, which provides for exceeding 50% of votes in the supreme governing body of the company, as well as parts providing for exceeding 50% of votes in the supreme governing bodies of Lifesell and Ukrtauer on December 29, 2023. The applications were returned to them as they did not meet the requirements set by the committee.
On January 23, 2024, AMCU received a second application to acquire the stake that provides control in Lifsell, Global Bilgi and Ukrtauer LLC from DVL Telecom, a member of the NJJ group.
According to market participants, a problem for the completion of the deal may also be the partial seizure of stakes in the companies being sold on charges against the under-sanctioned Mikhail Fridman, who indirectly controls a minority stake in Turkcell.
