Airbnb is transitioning hosts to a new service fee model: instead of the previous structure, under which hosts typically paid about 3% and guests paid a separate service fee, the platform is introducing a single commission for hosts.
Now, most hosts will pay 15.5% of the booking price. Airbnb explains this as a move to make pricing more transparent: guests will see the total cost without a separate service fee on top.
For hosts, this means they’ll need to adjust their prices. If they don’t change their rates, their net payout will decrease. According to Airbnb’s example, for a $100 booking, a host will receive $84.50 after the commission is deducted.
The transition is taking place in phases. For hosts outside the European Economic Area, the deadline for adjusting prices is September 15; for hosts within the EEA, it is October 13.
For the short-term rental market, this will increase pressure on property owners and management companies: they will have to recalculate rates, discounts, and financial models.
Polish Minister of National Defense Vladyslav Kosyniak-Kamysz stated that Ukrainians of draft age who are in Poland should be in Ukraine and serve their country.
“All young Ukrainians capable of fighting should be in Ukraine and serve their homeland there,” Kosiniak-Kamysz said during a speech, a video of which was published by the Video Parlament channel.
He also criticized Ukrainians who flaunt a lavish lifestyle in Poland or violate local rules. In particular, in the published excerpts from his speech, the minister stated that such cases “are not normal” and that such individuals should be deported.
The statement came amid a debate in Poland regarding the behavior of some Ukrainians residing in the country, as well as Ukraine’s mobilization needs. A separate incident that previously sparked public outrage involved a Ukrainian influencer who drove into the Morskie Oko area in the Tatra Mountains in defiance of a ban; Polish police sought a five-year ban on his entry into Poland and the Schengen Area.
At the same time, Kosyniak-Kamysz criticized far-right politicians and the opposition Law and Justice party for stoking anti-Ukrainian sentiment. He emphasized that since the start of the full-scale war, Poles have opened their homes and provided extensive assistance to Ukrainians without setting up refugee camps.
The Polish defense minister had previously expressed a similar position. In February 2025, in an interview with Radio ZET, he said that Ukrainians of draft age should leave Poland and fight for their country, and he also called the sight of young Ukrainian men in expensive cars and five-star hotels “indecent and unacceptable.”
The Polish minister’s new rhetoric coincided with discussions within the EU regarding changes to the temporary protection regime for Ukrainians. On June 26, 2026, the European Commission proposed extending temporary protection for people who fled the war in Ukraine until March 4, 2028, but at the same time noted that temporary protection, as a rule, should not be granted to new arrivals who cannot confirm that they have permission from the Ukrainian authorities to leave, given their military obligations.
Reuters, citing the European Commission’s proposal, reported that the restriction would apply to new arrivals—Ukrainian men of draft age without permission from the Ukrainian authorities to leave the country—but not to Ukrainians already under protection in EU countries.
Poland remains one of the leading EU countries in terms of the number of Ukrainians with temporary protection status. According to Eurostat, as of May 31, 2026, 967,505 people from Ukraine had this status in Poland, accounting for 22.1% of all individuals from Ukraine who had been granted temporary protection in the EU. Only Germany had a higher number—1.283 million people.
According to the Polish Office for Foreigners, approximately 993 thousand Ukrainian citizens in Poland are registered under temporary protection and hold a PESEL UKR number. In addition, 462 thousand Ukrainian citizens hold valid temporary residence permits, while another 92 thousand have permanent residence or long-term resident status in the EU.
Thus, Kosiniak-Kamysz’s statement reflects a tougher stance taken by a segment of the Polish political class: Warsaw continues to support Ukraine, but at the same time is increasingly raising the issue of mobilizing Ukrainians living abroad and condemning behavior that causes irritation in Polish society.
Kosiniak-Kamysz, mobilization, POLAND, TEMPORARY PROTECTION, UKRAINE
Indar, a private joint-stock company specializing in insulin production (Kyiv), saw its net profit drop by 23.6% in 2025 compared to 2024—to 12.388 million UAH.
According to the company’s disclosure in the National Securities and Stock Market Commission’s information disclosure system, revenue from sales in 2025 amounted to 562.024 million UAH, which is nearly 12% less than the previous year.
According to data from the OpenDataBot system, Indar’s revenue for the first quarter of 2026 was nearly 165 million UAH, with net profit of 4.844 million UAH.
Indar PJSC specializes in biotechnological drugs and is the only company in Ukraine with a full-cycle insulin production process: from the extraction of the active ingredient to the finished dosage form.
Indar’s core business is the production of insulin preparations, as well as medications for the blood coagulation system and metabolic therapy.
According to Experts.news, Taiwan’s receipt lottery system remains one of the best-known examples of how the government can improve tax compliance not through repression, but by changing the incentives for buyers and sellers.
The idea was introduced in Taiwan in 1951. Instead of trying to inspect every store, café, or kiosk, the authorities turned a sales receipt into a potential lottery ticket. A number appeared on every standardized receipt, and buyers had a personal incentive to request an official receipt even for small purchases.
Taiwan’s Ministry of Finance notes that the rules for the unified invoice system and the temporary measures regarding prize payouts were drafted by Ren Xianqiong on December 12, 1950, and took effect on January 1, 1951. The ministry explains the logic behind the system as follows: the hope of winning a prize encouraged citizens to request receipts, which helped prevent tax evasion and increase budget revenues.
The mechanism was simple: if a seller does not issue a receipt, the sale may go unnoticed by the tax authorities. But if a receipt gives the buyer a chance to win a cash prize, the interests of both parties shift. The seller may be interested in an unreported cash transaction, while the buyer—on the contrary—may want official confirmation of the purchase. In this way, the government effectively turns millions of consumers into voluntary enforcers of cash register compliance.
Today, the system continues to operate. The Taiwan Ministry of Finance’s tax portal publishes winning numbers every two months. Under the current prize structure, the special prize is 10 million New Taiwan dollars, the grand prize is 2 million New Taiwan dollars, and smaller prizes start at 200 New Taiwan dollars.
According to the Experts Club think tank, the key lesson of this model lies not in the lottery itself, but in the proper redistribution of incentives. The government does not increase the number of inspectors indefinitely but creates a situation in which the buyer has a personal stake in ensuring the transaction is properly recorded.
“The Taiwanese example shows that tax compliance often depends not only on the severity of penalties but also on the structure of incentives. If a citizen derives a clear personal benefit from a transparent transaction, the government can achieve a greater effect than through mass audits,” notes Maksim Urakin, founder of the Experts Club analytical center.
Taiwan is not the only example. In Europe, similar tools have been implemented or discussed in Portugal, Greece, Slovakia, Italy, Poland, and Malta.
In Portugal, the fight against VAT evasion was viewed not only as a task for the tax service but also as a public project. Under the electronic invoicing system, companies were required to issue invoices for all transactions and submit the data to tax authorities monthly, while consumers could receive tax credits for invoices in certain service sectors.
In Greece, the tax lottery is primarily linked to electronic payments. Citizens can check the number and serial numbers of lottery tickets generated based on monthly electronic transactions, and the tax authority publishes the results of the drawings.
Slovakia launched the National Receipt Lottery in 2013 amid one of the largest VAT collection gaps in Europe. In just the first two weeks, citizens registered over 7 million receipts. By September 2014, the number of registered receipts had risen to nearly 87 million.
Italy has also introduced a system under which most VAT receipts must include a unique code to participate in a regular state cash prize draw. This step followed similar measures in other European countries.
Another unexpected example is South Korea, where the government incentivized not receipts per se, but electronically tracked payments. In 1999, Korean tax authorities introduced a tax incentive for payments made with credit and debit cards, as well as electronic cash receipts. This policy helped shift the economy toward cashless transactions and sharply increase the share of business revenue flowing into the tax system.
In Brazil, a similar approach was implemented through tax rebate programs and incentives for consumers to provide their information on receipts. The Nota Fiscal Paulista program in the state of São Paulo utilized electronic business reporting and citizen participation to increase the transparency of retail transactions.
These solutions seem unusual because they challenge the traditional philosophy of tax administration. Instead of a “tax authority versus business” model, the government creates a triangle involving the seller, the buyer, and the tax authority. If the buyer is interested in receiving a receipt, it becomes more difficult for the seller to conceal revenue. If the payment is electronic, the tax authority receives more data. If citizens benefit from transparent transactions, oversight becomes cheaper and more widespread.
However, such tools are not a one-size-fits-all solution. They require digital infrastructure, trust in the government, personal data protection, clear rules for businesses, and oversight to ensure the system does not become a mere formality. Slovakia’s experience shows that the initial enthusiasm may wane, and some participants begin to use the system not so much as a form of civic oversight but rather as a regular lottery.
For countries with a high proportion of cash transactions and shadow economy activity, such models remain promising. They make it possible to increase tax collection without directly raising tax rates. It is not the prize draws themselves that are particularly promising, but rather their combination with electronic receipts, online cash registers, digital tax offices, and tax bonuses for citizens.
The Commercial Court of Lviv Oblast declared PJSC “Galicia” Oil Refining Complex (Drohobych Oil Refining Complex) bankrupt, with total creditor claims exceeding 18 billion UAH, and initiated liquidation proceedings, according to a court ruling dated June 25, 2026, published in the Unified State Register of Court Decisions.
“PJSC ‘Galychyna Oil Refining Complex’ is hereby declared bankrupt, and liquidation proceedings are hereby initiated. The term for conducting the liquidation proceedings is set at twelve months,” the document states.
The court hearing is scheduled for September 22, 2026, and will take place at the Commercial Court of Lviv Oblast.
According to the court ruling, control over NPK “Galychyna,” whose total debt exceeds 18 billion hryvnias, is transferred to a creditors’ committee comprising the state-owned companies JSC “Ukrnafta” and PJSC “UkrTatNafta.”
The court concluded that the complex’s financial and asset situation is critical, as its operations have been deeply unprofitable in recent years. Specifically, the company’s losses totaled nearly 7 billion hryvnias in 2024 and over 3.46 billion hryvnias in 2025, while the shortfall in assets to cover its debt amounts to more than 15.2 billion hryvnias.
The Drohobych-based NPK “Galychyna” is considered an asset of Ihor Kolomoyskyi and his business partners and has been under seizure since 2023.
BANKRUPTCY, LIQUIDATION, UKRNAFTA, НПК Галичина, УКРТАТНАФТА
The European Union plans to restrict children’s access to social media in all 27 member states, said European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen.
The European Commission is considering a multi-stage approach to children’s and teenagers’ access to digital platforms. According to expert recommendations, children under the age of 13 will be able to use social media only for a limited time and under the supervision of parents, guardians, or teachers. As teenagers get older, the restrictions should be gradually eased.
“It is clear that we need age-based restrictions for these platforms,” von der Leyen told reporters in Brussels. She noted that the question now is not whether children face risks online, but how to give them a safer start in the digital environment.
The European Commission is expected to present a concrete proposal after the summer. Reuters reports that von der Leyen may announce it during her annual State of the Union address in September.
The new rules could apply not only to traditional social media platforms but also to a wider range of services with “age-inappropriate” and addictive features. Von der Leyen referred to this as the “social media plus” category, which could include platforms with infinite scrolling, autoplay videos, personalized algorithms, and other mechanisms designed to capture users’ attention.
The main services affected could include TikTok, YouTube, Instagram, and Facebook. Reuters notes that similar restrictions, aimed primarily at the largest short-form video and social media platforms, are already in place or under discussion in various countries around the world.
The Associated Press reports that an EU expert group has recommended restricting access to social media for children under 13 until tech companies can prove that their platforms are safe for children. For teenagers over 13, the proposal calls for phased access only to those services that meet safety and age-appropriateness requirements.
The European Commission is also developing its own app to verify users’ ages online. Such a system should help platforms and EU member states enforce age restrictions, although officials in Brussels acknowledge that it is technically impossible to completely prevent users from circumventing these measures.
