As of 4 April, the cost of Ukrainian barley on the terms of FOB deepwater ports of Ukraine increased to $208-218 per MT that is 27% higher than the price level for the same period last year, the Ukrainian Agribusiness Club association (UCAB) has reported. The association said on its website that such a price for domestic grain crop is a record since the end of 2014.
“The key factor in the steady increase in barley prices over the past few months was the unstable demand from Saudi Arabia, which is the key importer of this grain in the world. In 2017, Ukraine shipped 2.07 million tonnes of barley to this country, which accounted for 57% of total exports,” analyst of agricultural markets of the UCAB Ilha Kharabara said.
This year, demand from Saudi Arabia is not sustainable – tenders for the purchase are infrequent, but volumes are quite significant. At the last tender, the Saudi Grains Organization (SAGO) announced the purchase of 1 million tonnes of barley, at the previous one was purchased 0.96 million tonnes.
The tense world balance at the beginning of the marketing year supported the price increase for barley – world production fell to 142.4 million tonnes in 2017/2018, which is 3.5 million tonnes less than last year.
The number of apartments sold in Kyiv in 2017 reached some 40,000, while the number of commission housing last year was 33,000 apartments, Director for LUN.UA real estate portal development Andriy Mima said at a press conference. “After holding a closed access poll among developers, when the respondents roughly announced how many facilities they sold, we estimated that about 40,000 apartments in Kyiv were sold in 2017. Some 33,000 apartments were put into operation, and 40,000 were sold. This means that there is no crisis of oversupply,” Mima said.
At the same time, according to the expert, the pace of construction in Kyiv city and region remains high.
“In Kyiv city in 2017 there were about 100 names of residential complexes, and in Kyiv region – about 150. That is, several residential complexes can be launched a month or even a week,” Mima said. According to the estimates of Marketing Analyst of City One Development Olena Shyrina, the number of investment transactions in the structure of housing sales is about 40%. “We have about 40% of deals going for the purpose of investing funds,” Shyrina said.
Romania’s Tacrom and Belorusneft will conduct hydraulic fracturing at 80 wells of public joint-stock company Ukrgazvydobuvannia for UAH 486.5 million, according to the ProZorro e-procurement system. Tacrom, in particular, won a lot during a tender and conduct hydraulic fracturing at 50 wells of Ukrgazvydobuvannia for UAH 303.8 million. Belorusneft wins another lot and will conduct hydraulic fracturing at 30 well for UAH 182.725 million.
Tacrom and Belorusneft were the only rivals during the tender.
Ukrgazvydobuvannia, which is wholly owned by NSJC Naftogaz Ukrainy, is a large gas processing company, which accounts for about 75% of total gas output in the country. It operates Shebelynka gas refinery.
The governments of Ukraine and Moldova have signed a memorandum on the synchronization of the work of the energy systems of the two countries with the ENTSO-E energy system of Europe. According to the press service of the Cabinet of Ministers of Ukraine, the relevant agreements were reached during the meeting of Prime Ministers of Ukraine and Moldova, Volodymyr Groysman and Pavel Filip.
“The parties noted that the energy and economic component of cooperation has a significant growth potential,” the message reads.
During the talks the parties discussed a wide range of road map of cooperation and agreed on the participation of Ukrainian PM Volodymyr Groysman at the GUAM summit in Chisinau in June this year, the press service of the Cabinet said.
The number of electric cars imported to Ukraine in the first quarter of 2018 tripled year-over-year, to 1,744 vehicles, according to a posting on the website of the State Fiscal Service. The authority said that in January 2018, some 784 passenger cars and other vehicles with electric engines were imported compared with 132 in January 2017, in February 2018, some 413 vehicles were imported (181) and in March – 537 (237).
As reported, in 2017, some 2,700 electric cars were imported to Ukraine.
In 2018, electric vehicles and other vehicles equipped exclusively with an electric motor are exempted from taxation by excise duty and value added tax (VAT) when they are transported to the customs territory of Ukraine.
The National Bank of Ukraine (NBU) expects the country’s Finance Ministry will place $2.5 billion in eurobonds in 2018, $1.5 billion in eurobonds in 2019. “In 2018 and 2019, we expect that eurobonds worth $4 billion will be placed: $2.5 billion this year and $1.5 billion next year,” Deputy NBU Governor Dmytro Solohub said at a briefing in Kyiv on Thursday.
