According to the results of 2024 and the first quarter of 2025, IMC (Industrial Milk Company) is in good financial condition, intends to reduce its debt below $20 million by the end of the year and will return to paying dividends, IMC CEO Alexander Verzhikhovsky said in an interview with the Polish edition of parkiet.com.
He noted that as of the end of March 2025, IMC had $44.7 million in cash and cash equivalents, which is 73% more than a year earlier. This allows the agricultural holding to reduce its financial debt as planned.
According to the CEO of the agricultural holding, IMC’s debt as of the end of 2024 amounted to more than $23 million, compared to $46 million at the end of 2023.
“This year, we are striving to further reduce our debt and plan to bring it down to below $20 million. At the same time, we have returned to paying dividends and are working to share our profits with shareholders in the form of significant dividends next year,” the IMC CEO emphasized.
In addition, he said that in March 2025, IMC completed investments in its own rolling stock. In total, since 2024, the company has invested about $22 million in the purchase of a fleet of 300 grain carriers.
Verzhykhovsky explained that owning grain cars allows the agricultural holding to largely abandon the use of leased cars for grain transportation to ports. “Currently, IMC can transport up to 80% of our annual grain production with its own railcars.
In addition, in 2024, the agricultural holding invested heavily in the renewal and modernization of its fleet, which directly affects the production processes related to soil preparation, sowing campaign, their efficiency and optimization of operations.
“IMC intends to maintain annual investments in equipment, technology and infrastructure modernization at the level of $10-12 million. The company does not plan to issue shares or increase debt. Investments will be made at the expense of own funds,” summarized IMC CEO.
IMC Agroholding is an integrated group of companies operating in Sumy, Poltava and Chernihiv regions (north and center of Ukraine) in the crop production, elevators and warehouses segments. The land bank is 116 thousand hectares, storage capacity is 554 thousand tons, with a harvest of 864 thousand tons in 2024.
IMC ended 2024 with a net profit of $54.54 million compared to a net loss of $21.03 million in 2023. Revenue increased by 52% to $211.29 million, gross profit quadrupled to $109.10 million, and normalized EBITDA increased 25 times to $86.11 million.
State-owned PrivatBank (Kyiv) will put up for sale its “bad” loans totaling UAH 5.2 billion through the SE SETAM platform, which will be open for bidding until July 30, 2025.
“PrivatBank offers professional market participants to register on the platform of the electronic trading system of the Ministry of Justice OpenMarket of SE SETAM until July 30, 2025 to acquire claims on a portfolio of consumer loans to individuals with a total debt of UAH 5.2 billion, which is the initial (starting) price of the lot,” the bank said on its website on Monday.
It is noted that the portfolio includes only the loan principal and accrued interest. The auction will be held in several stages: automatic gradual reduction of the starting price of the lot, submission of closed bids and open bids. The minimum selling price of a lot is 1.2% of the starting price.
According to the National Bank of Ukraine, as of April 1, 2025, PrivatBank ranked first in terms of total assets – UAH 945.4 billion, or 25.2% among 60 banks.
As reported, in 2025, PrivatBank had to put up for sale a portfolio of bad loans to individuals totaling more than UAH 5 billion.
The fixed real estate tax is more effective for community development than the share contribution, which was abolished by Law No. 132-IX for projects that began construction after January 1, 2021, Olena Shulyak, chairwoman of the Parliamentary Committee on the Organization of State Power, Local Self-Government, Regional Development and Urban Planning, told Interfax-Ukraine.
Shulyak, one of the authors of Law No. 132-IX, emphasized that communities already had a compensatory alternative at the stage of abolishing share contributions, namely a fixed real estate tax. This tool has a much higher potential for solving infrastructure problems, is easier to administer, and has much lower corruption risks than the share contribution.
“In fact, the share of equity participation in local budget revenues was very small – about 1%. These funds were not used for the construction of new kindergartens, schools and other infrastructure, and their intended purpose was not controlled. So, we have a real estate tax. I won’t say that it is a universal compensator, but now we see that it is already many times higher,” Shulyak said.
According to her, in 2020, local budgets received UAH 5.7 billion from this tax, in 2021 – UAH 7.8 billion, in 2022 – UAH 7.1 billion, despite the war, in 2023 – UAH 9.1 billion, in 2024 – UAH 10.7 billion, in 2025 (as of now) – UAH 4.3 billion.
“Regarding share contributions, we see the following figures: in 2020, the share participation funds amounted to UAH 1.4 billion, in 2021 – UAH 572 million, in 2022 – UAH 134 million, in 2023 – UAH 134 million again, in 2024 – UAH 199 million, and this year (as of now) – UAH 159 million,” the committee chairman cites the data for comparison.
Shulyak noted that equity participation as a tool has long been ineffective, and that is why it was abolished by law. However, according to her, this does not mean that communities do not have the right to defend their interests in court when it comes to cases that fall under the old legislation.
“Indeed, some communities, in particular Kyiv, remain active in legal disputes over equity participation. We are talking about situations where facilities received permits before 2020 but were completed later. In such cases, the legal basis for the claims is most often Article 1212 of the Civil Code of Ukraine – on unjustifiably retained property. As for other communities, we do not yet have centralized statistics on the number of lawsuits,” she said.
At the same time, in her opinion, if the agreement on the payment of equity participation was not concluded before the law on its abolition came into force, such charges are groundless.
Speaking about projects where the participants have changed during this time, Shulyak noted that if the new construction customer carries out construction in accordance with the construction permit issued to the previous customer before January 1, 2021, there are no grounds for non-payment of the share participation. However, if the construction permit was issued later than this date, the share participation is not paid.
“If the construction customer is implementing a completely new project – in terms of functionality, etc. – then in this case it is more expedient to terminate the previous permit and obtain a new one. Thus, the new permit will be obtained after January 1, 2021, and the construction customer will not have any obligations to pay the equity participation,” Shulyak recommends.
In January-May this year, Ukraine increased exports of processed pig iron in physical terms by 45.2% compared to the same period last year, up to 736,418 thousand tons from 507,106 thousand tons.
According to statistics released by the State Customs Service (SCS) on Friday, pig iron exports in monetary terms increased by 53.2% to $290.546 million during the period under review.
At the same time, exports were carried out mainly to the United States (79.11% of supplies in monetary terms), Italy (10.23%) and Turkey (5.90%).
In the first 5 months of the year, the country imported 29 thousand tons worth $55 thousand from Brazil (68.52%) and Germany (31.48%), while in January-May 2024, 15 tons of pig iron were imported for $35 thousand.
As reported, on March 12 this year, the United States began levying a 25% duty on imports of Ukrainian steel products, except for pig iron, in accordance with President Donald Trump’s decision.
In 2024, Ukraine reduced exports of processed pig iron by 3.4% in physical terms compared to 2023, to 1 million 290.622 thousand tons, and by 6.1% in monetary terms, to $500.341 million. Exports were mainly to the United States (72.64% of supplies in monetary terms), Turkey (8.03%) and Italy (7.30%).
In 2024, the country imported 38 tons of pig iron worth $90 thousand from Germany, while in the same period of 2023 it imported 154 tons of pig iron worth $156 thousand.
The French-Ukrainian Chamber of Commerce and Industry (CCIFU) in cooperation with the French Embassy in Ukraine held a Grand Charity Evening – the Festival of Music in Kyiv. The event, which was held in the best French traditions, was timed to coincide with the International Music Festival and had a charitable purpose – to raise funds to support the National Rehabilitation Center UNBROKEN Ukraine.
According to the organizers, the donations raised will be used to upgrade the rehabilitation department for patients with spinal cord injuries.
The concert was attended by the famous Ukrainian pianist Yevhen Khmara, the Svitlo Concert orchestra, and the popular Ukrainian band TVORCHI, who were the main guests of the evening. The event brought together representatives of the business community, diplomatic corps and cultural elite of Ukraine and France.
“This is an event about strength, solidarity and art, which demonstrates the unity of the French-Ukrainian community in the most difficult times for Ukraine,” the French-Ukrainian Chamber of Commerce and Industry (CCIFU) said.
The CCIFU emphasized that the Music Festival was also an opportunity for the Chamber member companies to express support for those in need and to reaffirm the importance of social responsibility of business.
The French-Ukrainian Chamber of Commerce and Industry (CCIFU), founded in 1994 as the Association of the French business community in Ukraine and since 2011 a member of the French Chambers of Commerce and Industry network, today unites more than 150 French and French-managed companies from various sectors of the economy.
The Board of Directors is governed by an elected seven-member Management Board and is financed by membership fees with no state funding.
The Franco-Ukrainian Chamber of Commerce and Industry is a key player in business cooperation between France and Ukraine. For 30 years of its activity, it has formed a community of 150 companies, functions as an institutional partner for business, implementing initiatives in the agricultural sector, investment, social and cultural projects, and strengthens the investment climate.
The effectiveness of CCIFU is confirmed by the resilience of its members in the Ukrainian market even during the war: not a single company left the country, and many continue to expand and invest thanks to the Chamber’s support and partnership with government agencies and foreign financial institutions.
Ukraine’s retail trade turnover increased by 6.6% in April 2025 compared to the same month in 2024, the State Statistics Service (Ukrstat) reported.
According to the State Statistics Service, in nominal terms, retail trade turnover amounted to UAH 783.205 billion in April this year.
Retail trade turnover in April to May this year decreased by 2.5%.
In January-April 2025, retail trade turnover grew by 5.5% compared to the same period of the previous year.
The State Statistics Service specifies that the turnover of retail trade enterprises (legal entities) in January-April 2025 increased by 5.2% compared to January-April 2024 and amounted to UAH 543.129 billion.
At the same time, in April compared to March of this year, the retail turnover of enterprises decreased by 2.5%, while by April 2024 it increased by 6.1%.
According to the statistics agency, Ukraine’s retail trade turnover increased by 5.1% in the first quarter of 2025 and amounted to UAH 577.932 trillion in nominal terms.
The State Statistics Service reminds that the data are given without taking into account the temporarily occupied territories of the Russian Federation and part of the territories where hostilities are (were) conducted.
