Governor of the National Bank of Ukraine (NBU) Valeriya Gontareva, presenting her report in the Verkhovna Rada, has recalled a large debt of famous Ukrainian businessmen on refinancing loans to the NBU.
“Let’s look in details at these unpaid UAH 45.2 billion in the past three years… I will give you a list of insolvent banks that are the largest debtors on refinancing loans and names of their ex-owners, as these are very famous oligarchs in our country… The absolute leader is Oleh Bakhmatiuk with loans of two his banks – Financial Initiative and VAB – UAH 10.2 billion, Bank Nadra of Dmytro Firtash owes UAH 9.8 billion, Mykola Lahun owes UAH 8 billion on Delta Bank’s loans, Kostiantyn Zhevaho and his Bank Finance and Credit owes UAH 6.3 billion to the NBU, Leonid Klimov who is now member of parliament and even a member of the parliamentary committee for financial policy and bank operations owns UAH 3.4 billion and all the rest – UAH 7.5 billion,” she said.
Gontareva recalled that bankruptcy of a bank does not mean that their former owners are fully exempted from paying debts of their banks. The NBU sent 12 applications to law enforcement agencies about the commitment of crimes by shareholders of these banks and initiated 44 litigations in courts.
“The national funds are to be returned, and that’s final!” she said.
She also reminded that the refinancing loans that were not returned to the central bank were mainly issued sine 2008 without proper collateral, which were non-liquid assets with values set several times higher than their market value.
The lifecell mobile operator has begun to provide 4G (LTE technology) communications services in roaming in partner networks in 21 countries, the operator’s press service has said.
“High-speed communications of the fourth generation is automatically switched on in partner networks for all subscribers with USIM cards and smartphones that support the LTE standard,” the company said.
According to the data released by the company, there are 68% smartphone users among lifecell subscribers, almost half of which support LTE.
LTE roaming for the operator’s subscribers is open in partner networks in the following countries: Belarus, Belgium, Brazil, Bulgaria, Canada, China, the Czech Republic, Egypt, Estonia, Georgia, Germany, Luxembourg, Montenegro, Poland, Romania, Russia, Serbia, Slovenia, Spain, and Turkey.
To use LTE roaming, subscribers need to have a smartphone that supports this standard, a USIM card, and manually select a partner network in the smartphone settings during their stay in one of these countries. Tariffs for services will be in accordance with the cost of roaming in a particular country.
As reported, lifecell in 2017 received UAH 503.6 million net loss compared with UAH 928.3 million of net profit in 2016.
Turkcell (Turkey) owns 100% of the shares of lifecell LLC.
The Verkhovna Rada has appointed people’s deputy from the People’s Front Party faction Liudmyla Denisova as the human rights commissioner. Such a decision was supported by 280 people’s deputies in an open vote at a plenary session on Thursday, an Interfax-Ukraine correspondent reported.
Earlier, the procedure for appointing an ombudsman was provided for voting by ballots. People’s deputies have made changes in the legislation, which provide for an open vote in the hall. However, the law on the human rights commissioner of the Verkhovna Rada still provides for a closed procedure on secret voting by ballots.
An hour earlier, Petro Poroshenko Bloc member Serhiy Alekseyev, who also claimed to be the Verkhovna Rada authorized representative for human rights, withdrew his candidacy.
The Verkhovna Rada has supported the proposal of the president of Ukraine to appoint Yakiv Smolii head of the National Bank of Ukraine (NBU). Yakiv Smolii is currently acting head of the central bank. 247 people’s deputies supported the corresponding decision on the appointment of Smolii at a plenary session on March 15. Yakiv Smolii until now has held the post of first deputy head of the NBU, since May 11, 2017 he had been acting head of the central bank.
The European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD) seeks to organize financing for 10 or 20 bio-energy projects in Ukraine in coming four years, EBRD Associate Director for Energy Efficiency and Climate Change in Ukraine, Poland and Caucasus Sergiy Maslichenko has told Interfax-Ukraine.
“We are taking part in financing of projects on construction of wind farms and solar power plants. These projects will be financed in the future. Now we want to focus more on bio-energy projects – biogas, bio-mass, production of next generation bio-ethanol [from waste]. We seek to finance 10 or 20 these projects in coming three or four years,” he said.
Maslichenko recalled that studies show that a potential of bio-energy in Ukraine (husk, straw and other agricultural waste) equals to 30 million tonnes of oil equivalent.
Earlier the EBRD organized financing for eight projects in this sphere in Ukraine. Now the bank is mulling three or four more projects.
“At the same time, practice shows that market participants do not have enough knowledge and competence in this area. We intend to prepare a special program by the end of the year. It will provide, among other things, experts and technical assistance. Possibly, a SEO-club for bioenergy will be organized,” the associate director of the EBRD said.
As reported, in December the EBRD decided to provide a loan of EUR 25 million to the agricultural holding Myronivsky Hliboproduct for the construction of a 10 MW biogas plant in Vinnytsia region.
The Cabinet of Ministers of Ukraine has sent UAH 400 million for the implementation of the Ukraine residential energy efficiency financing program in 2018, and 48% of which will be sent to homeowner associations. “The effectiveness of using 1 USD of state budget expenditures in one- and two-apartment houses is 10 times higher than in individual apartments in multi-apartment houses,” the explanatory note to the resolution says.
According to the document, out of UAH 400 million provided by the energy efficiency program for 2018-2020, the government allocated UAH 190 million for residential energy efficiency loans for homeowner associations and housing construction cooperatives. Another UAH 202 million will be used to “stimulate the population to introduce energy efficient measures,” and the remaining UAH 7.7 million will be used to recover part of the funds used to purchase boilers (except for gas and electric boilers).
In addition, the resolution provides for state support for the introduction of electric heating in high-rise buildings in cities where this is provided for by heat supply schemes.
Deputy Prime Minister, Regional Development, Construction, Housing and Utilities Economy Minister Hennadiy Zubko reminded that UAH 1.6 billion is provided for financing energy efficiency of homeowner associations this year within the framework of the Energy Efficiency Fund, the press service of the government said.
