Investment deals account for up to 10% of DIM Group’s sales structure, while the requested area of housing has decreased by 15%, DIM Group Marketing Director Daria Bedia said in response to an Interfax-Ukraine inquiry.
“As of today, we have about 10% of investment transactions in the formats of a multifunctional cluster, eco-city, multifunctional complex based on the concept of a 15-minute city in the central business and historical center, while the vast majority of transactions – a little more than 90% of them – are still exclusively for themselves. The fact that investors have started to return to the market at all is an encouraging signal,” she said.
According to her, the first investment deals in the company’s properties began in late summer and early fall of 2023. Before that, professional investors did not dare to return to concrete, but the situation is changing.
“Firstly, the profitability of individual complexes and formats, given the high rate of construction, successful concept and growing real demand for this object, is still higher than bank deposits, even in times of war. Secondly, when evaluating an investment for the future, people realize that a liquid lot can bring 50-60% in the future if you choose a competent strategy,” Bedia says.
According to her observations, the majority of investors now are those who had real estate in their portfolio before the war. They come on three conditions: high rates of construction, a liquid concept and brand of the developer, its reputation over the past two years of war.
At the same time, the requested area has decreased by about 15%, while interest in European layouts has doubled. A large kitchen-living room of 17 sq. m in comfort+ and 20 sq. m in the business segment, two bathrooms, and separate bedrooms are becoming a must-have attribute. The area of 1-room apartments, which are most often bought in the business segment, reaches 50-55 sq. m, 2-room apartments – 75-80 sq. m, 3-room apartments – 100-120 sq. m.
Today, buyers in the comfort+ segment are most interested in 1-room apartments of 40-47 sq. m. with a kitchen-living room of 20 sq. m. and a separate bedroom with a dressing room. The top 2-room apartments are 68 to 75 sq. m. in size with two separate bedrooms and a kitchen-living room of 20 sq. m., and 3-room apartments are 85-90 sq. m. in size with three separate bedrooms, one of which is a master bedroom with its own bathroom and wardrobe, and a large kitchen-living room is also a priority.
DIM Group was founded in 2014 and consists of six companies covering all stages of construction. To date, it has commissioned 12 houses in six residential complexes with a total living area of over 218 thousand square meters. Six residential complexes of “comfort+” and “business class” categories are under construction: “New Autograph, Metropolis, Park Lake City, Lucky Land.
The Cabinet of Ministers of Ukraine intends to intensify the School Bus program to purchase 1.5 thousand school buses from domestic producers over the next three years, Prime Minister of Ukraine Denys Shmyhal said.
“We plan to use a number of tools to help domestic producers in the near future. The first tool is public procurement. We will expand the list of categories of goods purchased from local producers. In particular, we are talking about expanding localization to defense procurement. (…) An additional incentive will be the intensification of the School Bus program. This is the purchase of 1.5 thousand buses over three years from Ukrainian manufacturers,” Shmyhal said at the Made in Ukraine forum in Kyiv on Monday.
For her part, First Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Economy Yulia Svyrydenko said that the Ukrainian government will look for opportunities to increase budget funding for the School Bus program to load up on orders from Ukrainian manufacturers.
“We have an existing School Bus program. We understand that the capacity of Ukrainian producers is twice as large as the budgeted limit of our program. Of course, we will look for ways to increase it in order to load Ukrainian producers with orders. We need 1600 school buses in the country now,” she said at the forum.
As reported, in 2024, as in the previous year, the state budget allocated UAH 1 billion for the purchase of school buses.
At the same time, Ukrainian manufacturers noted that if the amount of the subvention is maintained, bus purchases may be reduced by 15-20% compared to 2023, given the rise in bus prices.
School buses are purchased with co-financing from the state budget and local budgets.
In 2023, local budgets spent UAH 971.6 million out of the UAH 996.6 million subvention provided, while local councils purchased 434 buses out of the planned purchase of 546 school buses by the end of 2023.
In Ukraine, school buses are produced by Cherkasy Bus, Chernihiv Automobile Plant of Etalon Corporation, and Zaporizhzhia Automobile Plant of UkrAVTO Corporation.
Export sales of Ukrainian wheat are steadily growing. Since the beginning of February, more than 2 million tons have been contracted, which could be a record volume of deliveries for the season. As of March, 1.4 million tons of wheat have already been sold.
This issue was discussed on February 20 during the weekly briefing organized by the analytical center of the First Agricultural Ukrainian Cooperative (FUAC), created within the Ukrainian Agri Council.
“Traders say that Indonesia is very actively involved in purchases of Ukrainian feed wheat. This Asian country has sky-high prices on the domestic market and is interested in importing grain. The demand price from Indonesia is USD260-265/t CIF. It is very profitable to export Ukrainian wheat to Indonesia. The fly in the ointment for these plans is the conflict in the Red Sea, where there is a high risk of shelling of the merchant fleet. This is still a systemic problem that negatively affects trade in the Black and Mediterranean Seas. The risk is holding back Ukrainian traders from fixing their positions in this direction. The market expects that in the second half of March, the passage of ships through the Red Sea may stop completely. A logistical solution would be to detour ships by sea through Africa, but this will raise the cost of freight by USD10-12 per ton,” was mentioned by the FUAC.
Ukrainian wheat continues to be the cheapest on most markets.
“Last week, Ukraine sold wheat with a protein content of 12.5% to Egypt at USD224 per ton for delivery to Egypt. For comparison, Russian wheat cost USD245 on an FOB basis. Ukrainian wheat is very cheap compared to other grains in the EU, Egypt and Turkey. The trade tries to keep prices low so that it makes sense to trade on many bases. Price gaps are large, which keeps the CPT market at low levels. Nevertheless, there are more and more sellers of wheat on FOB basis, many farmers are willing to sell for USD195 per ton at the Danube ports. At the same time, on CPT terms, wheat costs USD175-188 per ton, and by the end of the week, the price tags may lose another USD2 per ton,” added the analytical department of the FUAC.
Canada will provide additional assistance to Ukraine to ensure “resilience and recovery” in the amount of 129 million Canadian dollars and more than $40 million, the press service of the Canadian government reported.
This was reportedly announced by Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, who is in Kyiv to mark the second anniversary of Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine.
“Prime Minister Justin Trudeau is visiting Ukraine today with international partners to reaffirm our continued and unwavering support for Ukraine,” the Canadian government said in a statement on its official website on Saturday.
“The Prime Minister of Canada has announced new support for Ukraine’s efforts to build resilience and recovery,” the statement said. It provides for the allocation of 75 million Canadian dollars for demining, cyber support and intelligence support, 15 million Canadian dollars to help create the National Museum of the Holodomor Genocide of 1932 and 1933 in Kyiv, up to 39 million Canadian dollars for mental health assistance, food support and for the reconstruction and restoration of local communities.
It is also reported that more than $22 million will be allocated “in humanitarian assistance to support United Nations and Red Cross partners in providing critical assistance, including emergency medical interventions, protection services, shelter, water, sanitation and nutrition, and promoting compliance with international humanitarian law.” More than $18 million will be allocated to support various projects: “from demining to reducing threats from nuclear or radiological materials and chemical weapons, as well as combating disinformation.”
Earlier, it was reported that President of Ukraine Volodymyr Zelenskyy and Canadian Prime Minister Trudeau signed a Security Agreement in Kyiv, which provides for the allocation of Canadian assistance in the amount of 3 billion Canadian dollars in 2024.
On Friday, February 23, Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba met with Spanish Foreign Minister Jose Manuel Albares.
“During our meeting, I thanked Jose Manuel Albares for Spain’s support and solidarity with Ukraine. Spain will prepare a new package of military assistance to Ukraine, which will include ammunition. We also discussed President Zelenskyy’s Peace Formula and the Global Peace Summit in Switzerland,” Kuleba wrote on social network X.
“We agreed that Ukraine’s accession to the EU is on the right track,” the Foreign Minister added.
Benchmark oil prices are falling on Monday morning after falling on Friday and last week.
The price of April futures for Brent on the London ICE Futures exchange at 78:11 Q4 is $81.33 per barrel, which is $0.29 (0.36%) lower than at the close of the previous session. Last Friday, these contracts fell by $2.05 to $81.62 per barrel.
Quotes for WTI futures for April in electronic trading on the New York Mercantile Exchange (NYMEX) by this time decreased by $0.33 (0.43%) to $76.16 per barrel. At the end of the previous session, they fell by $2.12 to $76.49 per barrel.
Over the past week, both brands fell by more than 2%.
Traders are keeping an eye on the situation in the Middle East and are waiting for the OPEC+ meeting to discuss the extension of oil production restrictions for another quarter.
“We still expect OPEC+ to extend production cuts into the second quarter of 2024 and begin to gradually lift them only in the third quarter,” Goldman Sachs analysts wrote.
The bank believes that oil prices will fluctuate between $70 and $90 per barrel.
Meanwhile, data from the oilfield services company Baker Hughes showed that over the past week, the number of operating oil rigs in the United States increased by six to 503 units. Meanwhile, the number of gas rigs decreased by one to 120.
