KYIV. Oct 7 (Interfax-Ukraine) – Viatrans SA (Switzerland) has become a shareholder in Persha insurance company (Kyiv) holding 22% of its share capital (132,000 shares).
The insurance company said that two individuals who held 33.47% of shares each (200,833 shares) reduced their stakes to 22.47% (134,833 shares).
As reported, the Association of International Road Carriers of Ukraine (AsMAP) held 24% of the share capital, 33.5% of shares belonged to company head Natalia Bezbakh and a member of the supervisory board Leonid Kostiuchenko each.
The Swiss company on March 4, 2016 officially announced its plans to acquire 22% of shares in the Ukrainian insurer. The national commission for financial service markets regulation approved the acquisition on September 8, 2016.
According to Standard-Rating, the appearance of a foreign investor in the insurance company would strengthen its capitalization and positively influence its business. The agency confirmed as “uaAА-” the national scale credit rating of the company.
Persha has been operating on the Ukrainian insurance market since September 2001. Its core business is car insurance using innovative IT technologies. The company is a member of the Motor (Transport) Insurance Bureau of Ukraine and national insurer of international transport of goods.
Its charter capital is UAH 60 million.
Viatrans SA, registered in 1987, is a holding company. It has around 15 subsidiaries.
KYIV. Oct 7 (Interfax-Ukraine) – Foreign investors who buy distressed assets have shown interest in Ukraine. Improved operation of the Deposit Guarantee Fund and judicial system activity on the domestic market of distressed assets should grow, the founder of ICU Investment Group Makar Paseniuk has said.
“Some specialized investors who buy distressed assets and work with risk legislation have shown interest in Ukraine. They are ready to participate in the privatization process,” he said at the Ukrainian Financial Forum in Odesa organized by ICU.
He said that the balance sheet value of assets of insolvent banks passed to the Deposit Guarantee Fund totals some UAH 405 billion.
“It is clear their market value according to the assessments [of the Deposit Guarantee Fund] is around 24% [of the balance sheet value] and, according to assessments of people who are ready to invest, at least five or seven percentage points less. However, this is around $2 billion, which is a large sum for our country,” Paseniuk said.
He said these assets of the fund are the most realistic for sale on the Ukrainian market. Similar opportunities in the private sector are an illusion, and the privatization is not interesting for financial investors.
Commenting on other tools in Ukraine, he said restructuring of foreign commercial debt and macrostabilization yield on domestic liabilities fell from 23% to 17-18% per annum, and for eurobonds reached some 8% per annum, compared to two-digit figures earlier.
He said rates for domestic loan bonds would fall proportionally to the reduction of the refinancing rate by the National Bank of Ukraine (NBU) and liquidity growth.
KHERSON. Oct 7 (Interfax-Ukraine) – Kherson region this season serviced over 3.5 million tourists, according to tentative data presented by Head of Kherson Regional Administration Andriy Hordeyev at Tavrian Horizons ninth international investment forum.
“This season inbound tourist flow grew by 15% and the number of foreign tourists grew by 12%,” he said.
Hordeyev said that next year growth would continue. The official called on investors to invest in tourism.
According to the State Statistics Service, the population of Kherson region as of August 1, 2016 was 1.06 million, while Ukraine’s population (not taking into account temporarily occupied Crimea and Sevastopol) was 42.7 million.
KYIV. Oct 6 (Interfax-Ukraine) – Dragon Capital Investments Limited (Cyprus), part of Dragon Capital, has finalized deals to acquire stakes in East Gate Logistic LLC (Boryspil) and West Gate Logistic LLC (Stoyanka, both Kyiv region) managing the eponymous logistic complexes near Kyiv.
The company’s press service reported on Thursday that the company acquired East Gate Logistic, a class A complex located in Boryspil, from Akron Investment Central Eastern Europe II B.V., and 60% of West Gate Logistic, a class A facility located in Stoyanka, from GLD Holding GmbH. The deal values were not disclosed.
“Despite high vacancy rates across the Kyiv region’s warehousing market, the level of its saturation with quality class A properties remains low. It is therefore not surprising that both East Gate and West Gate enjoy vacancies of under 8%, while the average rate across the market is 15%… We expect to further increase their occupancy in the near future and keep improving their results,” Volodymyr Tymochko, Managing Director and Head of Private Equity at Dragon Capital, said.
Built in 2007, East Gate Logistic has 49,600 square meters of total space and a leasable area of 49,100 square meters. West Gate Logistic was built in 2008 and has 97,200 square meters of total and 96,300 square meters of leasable area.
KYIV. Oct 6 (Interfax-Ukraine) – Ukraine needs to build the land market that stimulates the economic development of agriculture, Ukrainian Finance Minister Oleksandr Danyliuk has said.
“First we need to decide what the land market will be. Do you think it does not exist? Of course, it is. It exists, but in the way that limits the development of agriculture in the interests of those who now use it. No one thinks about the interests of people,” he said at a briefing.
The minister said the current situation with the land market in Ukraine is formed only by about “twenty” influential people, although many Ukrainians are owners of land.
According to the minister, the formation of a modern land market will facilitate the creation of new jobs in the agricultural sector.
KYIV. Oct 6 (Interfax-Ukraine) – Ukraine’s Cabinet of Ministers has passed a resolution on reconstruction of four substations of national energy company Ukrenergo in Kharkiv and Dnipropetrovsk regions with a total cost of EUR 150 million using funds raised from Germany.
The document has been approved at a government meeting on Wednesday.
The substations would be reconstructed under a Ukrainian-German project on construction and development of infrastructure in eastern Ukraine. Its cost is EUR 500 million.
Energy and Coal Industry Minister of Ukraine Ihor Nasalyk said that the sides have agreed the issue. At the end of this week the Finance Ministry will discuss the credit rates with German colleagues.
