Ukrproduct Group, a major Ukrainian producer of packaged butter and processed cheese, reported a net loss of GBP 2.04 million for 2024, compared with a net profit of GBP 0.39 million in 2023.
“Financial expenses in 2024 increased by 253% compared to the previous year to GBP 2.8 million, which was caused by significant accruals of commission for deferral on a loan from the EBRD, applied retrospectively for the period from October 2016 to December 2024,” the company explained in its annual report on the London Stock Exchange.
According to the report, in December 2024, the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD) decided to exercise its right under the loan agreement and charged a commission of GBP 2.0 million, increasing the company’s liability to the bank to GBP 8.1 million.
The group’s gross profit for the past year increased by 3.9% to GBP7.12 million, while operating profit fell by 36.6% to GBP1.08 million, and EBITDA by 29% to GBP1.7 million.
As for Ukrproduct’s revenue, it grew by 13% in hryvnia over the past year, while in British pounds sterling, the increase was only 0.2% to GBP37.08 million.
“The processed cheese segment generated revenue of GBP 21.2 million in 2024, down 15% from the previous year. This was largely due to a reduction in price promotions at the national level due to rapid cost increases caused by sharp fluctuations in the dairy raw materials market and the risk of loss-making sales,” the company explained.
According to the report, the butter segment achieved revenue of GBP 5.2 million in 2024, compared to GBP 3.1 million in the previous year. This 70% growth was primarily driven by increased production following a period of slight stagnation, with the market becoming receptive to higher supply.
Sales of spreads fell by 12% to GBP 4.0 million, reflecting increased competition in the market and changing consumer preferences.
Ukrproduct recalled that in the fourth quarter of 2023, it expanded its range of products with a longer shelf life to include a new category of sandwich spreads, which showed profitable growth: sales in 2024 amounted to GBP 1.2 million.
Sales of skimmed milk powder increased by 8% last year to GBP 1.4 million, but declined by 23% in volume terms. It is noted that prices for skimmed milk powder had only limited upside potential in 2024, and the group minimized the release of this product for sale in favor of using semi-finished milk protein as an ingredient in the production of processed cheese.
Sales of kvass and other beverages increased by 31% year-on-year to GBP 2.3 million in 2024, thanks to positive kombucha sales dynamics, supported by new product launches and strong brand positioning.
Ukrproduct noted that administrative and commercial expenses in 2024 increased by 4% year-on-year to GBP4.2 million.
This increase was mainly due to higher payroll and related expenses, as well as higher insurance and consulting expenses. Other operating expenses increased to GBP 1.8 million in 2024 compared to GBP 1.1 million in the previous year.
In light of the expected deterioration in the business outlook and increased future risks, the group recognized a net impairment loss of GBP 1.1 million on financial assets, reflecting provisions made for receivables and prepayments to suppliers. In addition, this line includes a write-off of goods in the amount of GBP 0.1 million and a provision of GBP 0.4 million for blocked VAT invoices.
Ukrproduct’s net assets as of December 31, 2024, amounted to GBP 2.0 million, down from GBP 4.5 million a year earlier, while cash balances decreased to GBP 0.1 million.
According to the agricultural holding, it has been in dialogue with the EBRD since 2021 regarding the potential restructuring of the loan and accrued interest and fees, and discussions are ongoing. At present, the EBRD has not taken any action to accelerate the repayment of the accumulated loan.
Assessing its prospects for 2025, Ukrproduct assumes that the business environment will remain unstable due to the ongoing war in Ukraine and financial pressure.
“The Group will continue to pursue a prudent capital allocation policy, prioritize liquidity preservation, seek new financing opportunities, and focus on meeting its existing commitments.
EBRD, LOAN, LOSS, UKRPRODUCT
The share of revenue not from the core telecommunications business of Ukraine’s largest telecommunications operator Kyivstar, which will amount to about 20% by the end of this year, is expected to reach 50% in five years thanks to planned investments of $1 billion over the next three years, said Zoya Dronchkevich, Kyivstar’s business development director and member of the supervisory boards of Helsi.me and Uklon.
“In five years, we aim to have around 50% of the group’s revenue coming from non-telecom sources with our investments of around $1 billion over three years. That is our goal,” said Dronchkevich at the Forbes Money forum in Kyiv.
Among the areas of investment for Kyivstar, which this year acquired Uklon and bought out the minority stake in Helsi, she named healthcare, education, fintech, entertainment, and advertising.
“We have a number of interesting organic experiments that could grow into inorganic ones. And we have strategic bets on certain industries that will help us make up the missing percentage to achieve our goal,” added the business development director.
She also emphasized that the most important task is to increase revenue through synergies between these businesses.
“Our strategy is not to tell telecom companies what to do, but to give them access to capital, enable them to leverage synergies from telecom and the ecosystem, create new value, and scale Ukrainian products abroad,” Droshkevich described Kyivstar’s approach to cooperation with partners.
Commenting on the acquisition of up to 100% of Helsi, she said that this is not the last deal in the healthcare sector.
“We will definitely be developing healthcare for several years. And it will be a whole ecosystem in itself. In addition to being part of the larger Kyivstar ecosystem and galaxy,” the director emphasized.
According to her, this involves both the development of B2C areas, where customers will soon see new products in the Helsi app, and investments in B2B. “For example, a few months ago, we approved a separate investment in private clinics and will compete there as well,” said Dronshkevich, also mentioning medical insurance.
She added that the company is also investing in R&D for overseas expansion, and certain elements of the ecosystem will be expanded to the markets of VEON, Kyivstar’s parent company.
“We have already grown the second player in the entertainment market, OTT TV Kyivstar TV, and we will continue to develop this area.
We are definitely very interested in fintech, which fits very organically into the ecosystem. This is far from a simple story,” said the Kyivstar business development director, listing the next areas of focus. She clarified that in fintech, there is a choice between an organic and inorganic scenario.
Droshkevich also mentioned investments in delivery, where, thanks to the acquisition of Uklon, the company already has a few percent of revenue.
“Advertising Tech is also an area of interest for us, where our clients, our data, and the presence of our ecosystem are a competitive advantage for this business. And it will help it generate additional revenue,” the director noted.
According to her, Kyivstar is also interested in B2B SAS solutions and fundamental B2B infrastructure areas. She recalled that the operator has already become the largest Microsoft distributor in Ukraine, and this major strategic partnership will continue to develop.
Droshkevich also acknowledged Kyivstar’s significant interest in the education sector and said that she had already interviewed 17 founders of LMS (Learning Management System) companies in Ukraine.
“I have met with eight different founders over the past month. We have selected the top three, who are in completely different segments. Perhaps we will start with commercial partnerships, perhaps we will start directly with a joint venture, and education is definitely of interest to us,” said the director.
Passenger traffic across the Ukrainian border during the week of May 24-30 increased by 1.4% to 506,000 with the approach of summer, according to data from the State Border Service on Facebook.
According to them, the outbound flow even decreased from 254,000 to 253,000, while the inbound flow increased from 245,000 to 253,000.
The number of vehicles that passed through checkpoints this week remained at around 124,000, and the flow of vehicles carrying humanitarian cargo also remained almost unchanged at 524.
At the same time, on Saturday, May 31, after the last bells of the school year, the State Border Service recorded an increase in the outbound flow to 47,000 people compared to 40,000 last Saturday.
According to the agency, on Sunday morning, there was a buildup of vehicles leaving Ukraine at the Ugriniv and Krakivets checkpoints on the Polish border, and at the Shehyni and Krakivets checkpoints, there was also a buildup of vehicles entering Ukraine.
To avoid traffic jams and save time, the State Border Service recommends choosing alternative checkpoints (PP): “Nizhankovychi,” “Smilnytsia,” “Hrushiv,” or “Rava-Ruska,” and reminds that due to large-scale repair work at the “Shehyni” checkpoint, traffic is temporarily complicated, leading to increased waiting times.
As of 9:00 a.m. on Sunday, there were also significant queues at the border with Slovakia at the Uzhhorod checkpoint – 25 cars, and at the border with Romania at the Porubne checkpoint – 30 cars.
As for the border with Hungary, 10 vehicles were waiting to cross at the Tisa, Kosino, Luzhanka, and Vylok checkpoints, and 5 at the Dzvinkove checkpoint.
The total number of people crossing the border this year is almost the same as last year: during the same seven days, 258,000 people left Ukraine and 243,000 entered, but the flow of cars was lower – 115,000.
Last year, a significant summer increase in passenger traffic began in the first week of June and lasted for five weeks in a row.
As reported, from May 10, 2022, the outflow of refugees from Ukraine, which began with the start of the war, was replaced by an influx that lasted until September 23, 2022, and amounted to 409,000 people. However, since the end of September, possibly influenced by news of mobilization in Russia and “pseudo-referendums” in the occupied territories, followed by massive shelling of energy infrastructure, the number of people leaving exceeded the number of people entering. In total, from the end of September 2022 to the first anniversary of the full-scale war, it reached 223,000 people.
During the second year of the full-scale war, the number of border crossings to leave Ukraine, according to the State Border Service, exceeded the number of crossings to enter by 25,000, during the third year by 187,000, and since the beginning of the fourth year by 30,000.
As Deputy Minister of Economy Serhiy Sobolev noted in early March 2023, the return of every 100,000 Ukrainians home results in a 0.5% increase in GDP.
In its April inflation report, the National Bank again estimated the outflow from Ukraine in 2024 at 0.5 million (according to the State Border Service – 0.315 million). In absolute terms, this means an increase in the number of migrants remaining abroad to 6.8 million in 2024. The NBU also maintained its forecast for the outflow in 2025 at 0.2 million.
According to updated data from the UNHCR, the number of Ukrainian refugees in Europe as of April 17, 2025, was estimated at 6.358 million, and worldwide at 6.918 million, which is 15,000 fewer than on March 20.
In Ukraine itself, according to the latest UN data at the end of last year, there were 3.669 million internally displaced persons (IDPs).
The second round of presidential elections is taking place in Poland on Sunday, with Poles choosing their head of state from two candidates: Warsaw Mayor Rafal Trzaskowski and Karol Nawrocki, head of the opposition conservative Law and Justice party and head of the Institute of National Remembrance.
Polling stations in Poland opened at 7 a.m. and voting will end at 9 p.m.
During the first round of the current presidential election, 67.31% of eligible voters cast their ballots.
A week before the election, Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk called presidential candidate Nawrocki’s statement that Poland would never support Ukraine’s accession to NATO an act of treason.
Earlier, the Experts Club analytical center released a video analysis dedicated to the most important elections in the world in 2025. For more details, see here —
https://youtu.be/u1NMbFCCRx0?si=6L76qeuNamxg6py1
Economic experts predict a further decline in inflation in Germany in the second half of 2025. The main factors contributing to this are:
Lower energy prices
Stronger euro
Slower wage growth
Lower external demand due to trade tensions
Thus, inflation in Germany in January-May 2025 shows a steady downward trend, approaching the ECB’s target level. This creates the conditions for monetary policy easing and supports expectations of economic stability in the second half of the year.
Impact on monetary policy
The slowdown in inflation in Germany and other eurozone countries is strengthening expectations of interest rate cuts by the ECB. In May 2025, inflation in the eurozone stood at 2.1%, in line with the ECB‘s target.
The ECB is expected to decide at its meeting on June 4–5, 2025, to lower its key interest rate by 0.25 percentage points to 2.0%. This will be the eighth rate cut since June 2024, when it stood at 4.0%.
The OKKO Group, which includes the operator of the eponymous network of gas filling stations, Concern Galnaftogaz, plans to have approximately 600 MW of wind power capacity over the next five years, 200 MW in solar energy, and 150 MW in energy storage facilities (ESF), according to Vasyl Danylyak, CEO of OKKO GROUP and co-founder of GORO Mountain Resort.
“In the energy sector, we see ourselves in about five years with approximately 600 MW in wind, 200 MW in solar, and about 150 MW in batteries. We have already accomplished some of these goals,” he said during a Forbes Ukraine Business Breakfast broadcast on his YouTube channel on Thursday.
He also added that in the agricultural sector, which is a very interesting business, the group sees its KPI (key performance indicator) as increasing efficiency per hectare.
At the same time, he denied the possible exit of the group’s fuel business to public capital markets, but suggested that this could be done to some extent for other areas of activity.
“We thought about the public capital market for our core business, retail. This is not possible now because the fuel business has become unfashionable and toxic for capital markets, banks, and MFIs. But if we are talking about other businesses, then most likely it will not be classic public capital markets, but perhaps specialized large funds operating in certain areas. This is more realistic,” said the CEO of OKKO.
As reported, the OKKO Group is building the 147 MW Ivanychi wind farm in the Volyn region with a total cost of EUR 225 million (excluding VAT) and is seeking financing for its second wind energy project in this region, the 192 MW Zatyrintsy wind farm, which is estimated at EUR 250 million (excluding VAT).
The group also won a five-year special auction held by NEC Ukrenergo for the provision of power system balancing services, at which it announced the installation of a 20 MW energy storage facility (ESF).
In addition, the group plans to open a new 60,000-tonne elevator by autumn 2025 and a bioethanol plant in summer 2026. An important component of OKKO’s agricultural portfolio is its partnership with Gadz-Agro in the Ternopil region, in which the company acquired a stake in 2023. The enterprise cultivates 26,000 hectares of land and has about 10,000 head of cattle, including 5,000 dairy cows. It is also one of the largest horticultural farms in Ukraine, but OKKO decided not to integrate the horticulture business into its operations.
OKKO Group unites more than 10 diverse businesses in the fields of manufacturing, trade, construction, insurance, services, and other services. The flagship company of the group is Galnaftogaz, which operates one of the largest gas station chains in Ukraine under the OKKO brand, with almost 400 gas stations.
The founder and ultimate beneficiary of the group is Vitaliy Antonov.
