Groups of fans from around the world are arriving in Qatar, where the FIFA World Cup will begin on Sunday, Middle Eastern media reported. Fans gather in the streets of Doha, singing songs, dancing and preparing for the start of the tournament. Fans are traditionally dressed in the colors of their teams, with Dutch fans in bright orange jerseys already strolling around the city, as well as large numbers of Mexican fans in sombreros and Brazilians in yellow shirts and with national flags.
Qatar is expected to host 1.2 million fans during the tournament.
Earlier on Friday, 48 hours before the start of the tournament, the International Football Federation (FIFA) said that after discussions with Qatar’s authorities it had decided not to sell alcoholic beverages in the eight soccer stadiums that will host matches of the 2022 World Cup. However, it is allowed to sell alcoholic beverages at Fan Festival events, other fan venues and licensed venues. Budweiser non-alcoholic beer will remain available at the stadiums.
Budweiser is one of the main sponsors of FIFA, and therefore only beers of this brand can be sold at FIFA World Cups. Western media reports that Budweiser’s sponsorship amounts to $75 million.
Western media note that the company is working on an agreement to turn one of the luxury hotels in downtown Doha into its own theme park, where a bottle of beer will be sold for at least $15.
Meanwhile, sales of Qatar’s popular drink, Karak, a spicy tea with milk and spices, have soared in the country. Its price is less than $0.30.
Initially, Qatar authorities allowed the sale of alcohol near stadiums, but asked to make the points of sale not too noticeable.
The FIFA World Cup will be held from November 20 to December 18 in Qatar. For the first time in history, the tournament will be held in the Middle East.
The first match will be held on Sunday. On the field will be the players of Qatar, which hosts the World Cup, and Ecuador.
In Ukraine, all matches will be available for viewing on Suspilnogo platforms. World Cup matches will be broadcasted on Suspіlne Sport site (live broadcasts, match records and highlights), local Suspіlne TV channels (live and delayed broadcasts) and Radio Luch (radio broadcasts of matches).
The United States, through the United States Agency for International Development (USAID), is providing up to $20 million to the Grain from Ukraine initiative announced by President Vladimir Zelensky at the G20 Summit earlier this week to help feed people around the world, USAID said in a release Friday.
“USAID will provide support through the United Nations World Food Program (WFP) to facilitate the delivery of additional shipments of Ukrainian grain through the Black Sea Grain Initiative,” the release said.
The U.S. agency recalls that before Putin’s invasion, Ukraine was one of WFP’s largest grain suppliers and the fourth largest commercial exporter of wheat in the world.
Today’s announcement builds on WFP’s existing $173 million support to date to buy Ukrainian grain to feed people in countries facing the most severe food crises, including Ethiopia, Yemen, and Afghanistan. Thanks to U.S. funding, 210,000 tons of food was purchased, enough to feed an estimated 12.6 million people for one month.
All told, since the start of Putin’s war against Ukraine in February, the U.S. has provided more than $11 billion to combat the global food crisis, including nearly $8.6 billion in humanitarian aid, the release indicated.
According to it, USAID also continues to help Ukrainian farmers who risk their lives to feed the world through the Agricultural Sustainability Initiative-Ukraine (AGRI-Ukraine). The initiative focuses on four areas that are critical to supporting Ukraine’s agricultural exports and its contribution to global food security: providing critical resources for farmers; improving export logistics and infrastructure; improving farmers’ access to finance; and addressing the needs of drying, storing, and processing crops. USAID has invested $100 million in the initiative, and the agency seeks to raise at least $150 million in additional funding from other donors, foundations and the private sector.
Moderate to light snow is expected in western regions of Ukraine on Saturday, November 19, according to the Ukrhydrometeocenter.
Temperatures in the west of the country will be 2-7° frost at night, 0-5° frost during the day, in Transcarpathia from 1° frost to 4° heat.
In northern, central and eastern regions, moderate to heavy snow at night, turning to rain during the day in central and eastern regions, with some sleet and glazed frost.
The temperature at night is 1-6° below freezing, during the day – from 2° below freezing to 3° above freezing (in the east of the country – 5-10° above freezing); in Kirovograd and Dnipropetrovsk regions at night is about 0°, during the day – 7-12° above freezing.
Moderate to heavy rains at night in the southern part of the country. The temperature at night will be 2-7° warm, during the daytime 9-14°, in the Crimea up to 16°.
Throughout Ukraine, except in the south, there is ice on roads. Winds mostly northwest, 7-12 m / s, in the east and southeast regions during the day gusts of 15-20 m / s.
November 19 in Kiev, heavy to moderate snowfall, sleet and snowdrift during the night, roads are icy. The wind is mostly north-west, 7-12 m/s. The temperature at night is 2-4° below zero, while during the day it’s about 0°.
According to the Central Geophysical Observatory of Boris Sreznevsky, the highest daytime temperature in Kiev on November 19 was +14.4°C in 1926, the lowest night-time temperature was -17.6°C in 1902.
On Sunday, November 20, snow in Ukraine at times, rain in the south of the country, no precipitation on the left bank. It is icy everywhere except the southern regions. The wind is mostly east, 7-12 m/s.
The temperature at night is 3-8°C cold, in the eastern and southern regions about 0°C; during the day – from 3°C frost to 2°C warm, in Transcarpathia and the east of the country – 1-6°C, in the southern regions – 8-13°C, in the Crimea – 14-19°C.
November 20, no precipitation at night and snow during the day in Kiev. There is freezing snow on roads. Wind eastward, 7-12 m/s. The temperature at night is 5-7° frost, and during the day – 0-2° frost.
The mining and metallurgical group Metinvest intends to receive compensation from Russia for the enterprises destroyed by the war and direct it to the development of Ukrainian assets.
“We should get full compensation for the damage from the Russians and reinvest it in restarting Ukrainian plants,” Metinvest CEO Yury Ryzhenkov said on the air of Ian King Live on Sky News in Britain.
According to him, the company helps Ukraine defend itself against Russian attacks. He also shared the latest news about the current activities of the group’s enterprises and presented a steel bracelet “Azovstal. Symbol of indestructibility”, a joint project with UNITED24 presidential charity platform to raise funds for the Armed Forces of Ukraine. Metinvest’s participation in the project is part of Rinat Akhmetov’s Steel Front militarized initiative.
“From the first days of the full-scale invasion, both of our shareholders (Rinat Akhmetov and Vadim Novinsky) decided that the company should support the Armed Forces of Ukraine. Therefore, in addition to using our equipment to create a defense line, we developed new ways to produce armored steel, which is now used in body armor. We have supplied the Ukrainian Army and Territorial Defense with over 150,000 body armor. We have also developed new steel mobile shelters that can be used in the field to heat and protect the military from shelling,” said the top manager.
In addition, the group purchases and supplies the army with vehicles, armored vehicles, thermal imaging cameras, radios, etc. A large number of vehicles and equipment needed by the Ukrainian defense forces in the field.
Answering the question about what major assets of the company are now operating in Ukraine, the General Director stated that at present the group has two metallurgical plants in Ukraine: one in Zaporizhzhya and the other in Kamensk. Both of them are in operation now and their capacities are about 50-60% loaded. The company may produce armored plates, steel shelters, etc.
As for the group’s foreign assets, they experienced some difficulties at first mainly because they relied on semi-finished products from Azovstal to operate.
“Since then we have diversified our sources of supply of semi-finished products. For example, here in the UK, slabs are now supplied by British Steel, ThyssenKrupp. In Italy it is ADI. We have found different suppliers that can provide the volumes we need,” said the CEO.
According to him, everyone in the U.K. is working under the same conditions. And the steel industry is as competitive as it can be.
“But when it comes to support, and we’re all colleagues, we understand how we can support each other in the industry,” Ryzhenkov said.
Asked about the situation in Mariupol, which is under occupation, he said the group knows little about what is happening in Mariupol right now.
“There are still quite a few people there, but they can’t say much about what’s going on in the city. As far as I understand, the power supply is unstable, there is no water, no heating, there is a humanitarian disaster in the city right now,” the head of the company explained.
And again expressed confidence that there will be compensation for the destroyed plants.
“We are confident that we should receive full compensation for the losses from the Russians and reinvest it in the Ukrainian plants to resume their work,” the top manager summarized.
“Metinvest is a vertically integrated group of mining and metallurgical enterprises. The enterprises of the group are mainly located in Donetsk, Luhansk, Zaporizhia and Dnipropetrovsk regions.
The major shareholders of the holding are SCM Group (71.24%) and Vadim Novinsky’s Smart Holding (23.76%) that manage it jointly.
Metinvest Holding LLC is the management company of Metinvest Group.
COMPENSATION, DEVELOPMENT, METINVEST, RUSSIAN FEDERATION, Ukrainian plants
Insurance company ARX Life (ARX Life, Kyiv) in January-September 2022 collected insurance premiums for UAH 197.7 mln, which is 16.82% less than a year earlier, according to Standard-Rating RA website updated its credit rating/ financial stability (reliability) rating of the insurer on the national scale at uaAAA.
Credit-Rating notes that decrease of gross business of the company has been caused by Russian aggression, introduction of martial law, fall of business activity level in the country and is the general tendency in the insurance market of Ukraine.
The volume of payouts and indemnities of the insurer has grown by 1,36% up to UAH 37,735 mln in the 9 months of 2022 comparing to the same period of 2021. Therefore, the level of payments of the insurer has grown by 3,43 p.p., up to 19,09%.
Acquisition expenses of the insurer have decreased by 17,85% down to UAH 111,458 mln in the first three quarters of 2022 in comparison with the same period of 2021.
According to the results of work during the nine months of 2022 the company has received a net profit of UAH 17,196 mln, that is by 17,74% lower than the profit received in January-September 2021.
As of October 1, 2022 assets of the company increased by 12.3%, to 222.351 million UAH, shareholders’ equity increased by 17.53%, to 115.294 million UAH, liabilities increased by 7.16%, to 107.057 million UAH, cash and cash equivalents increased by 2.89 times and amounted to 74.154 million UAH.
RA notes, that as of the reporting date the insurer has made financial investments in the amount of UAH 126,548 mln, entirely consisting of government bonds. The availability of such investments had a positive impact on the liquid assets of ALC IC ARKS Life, which in the aggregate exceeded its liabilities in 1,87 times.
The Agency draws attention to that JSC IC ARKS has unprecedentedly high level of external support from the main shareholder with headquarters in Toronto (Canada) – Fairfax Financial Holdings Limited – a holding company which through its subsidiaries is mainly engaged in insurance against accidents, property insurance and investment management.
Dniprovsky Iron and Steel Plant (DMZ, formerly Evraz-DMZ), part of DCH Steel Group of DCH businessman Oleksandr Iaroslavskyi, according to the results in 2021 received a net profit of UAH 1 billion 725.157 million, while finished the year 2020 with a net loss of UAH 394.091 million.
According to the note attached to the agenda of the annual meeting of shareholders, scheduled for December 22, which will be held remotely, the outstanding loss at the end of last year was UAH 826.728 million.
The shareholders intend to summarize the results of the activity in 2021, approve reports and direct the received profit to redeem the losses of the previous years.
The meeting will also consider personnel matters: dismissal of members of the Supervisory Board and Revision Commission and election of new ones.
Besides, the shareholders will elect the company auditor and approve the major transactions.
DMZ specializes in the production of steel, pig iron, rolled steel and rolled products.
On March 1, 2018, DCH Group signed an agreement to purchase Dneprovsky Metallurgical Plant from Evraz.
According to NDU as of the fourth quarter of 2020, Drampisco Limited (Cyprus) owns 97.7346% of DMZ shares.
The authorized capital of PrJSC is UAH 574.994 mln, the nominal value of one share is UAH 0.25.
