The Ministry of Agriculture and Farmers Welfare of India has included Ukraine in the list of countries that do not treat grain crops with fumigants containing methyl bromide (CH3Br), the State Service of Ukraine for Food Safety and Consumer Protection reported, citing the Embassy of Ukraine in the Republic of India.
“This will make it possible to exempt domestic exporters from paying additional payments (penalties) stipulated by local legislation and export grain cargoes during disinfection with aluminum phosphide-based preparations,” the State Service of Ukraine for Food Safety and Consumer Protection said in a statement on Tuesday.
The agency clarified that Ukrainian grain for export to India should be disinfected with aluminum phosphide-based products only. It is recalled that work to resume exports of Ukrainian grain to India has been underway since 2016.
Volodymyr Lavrenchuk, Head of the Ukrainian office of NEQSOL Holding, who headed Ukraine’s largest foreign bank, Raiffeisen Bank, in 2005-2019, has become the head of the Supervisory Board of state-owned Oschadbank (Kyiv), where he became an independent member in July this year following a government decision three months earlier.
“The renewed Supervisory Board of Oschadbank has started its work. At its first meeting, it elected Volodymyr Lavrenchuk as chairman,” the bank said in a statement on Tuesday.
It is specified that Lavrenchuk has 36 years of experience in the banking sector, including 27 years in the top management of Oschadbank and Raiffeisen Bank, and since 2020 he has been the head of the Ukrainian office of NEQSOL Holding with a focus on investment and portfolio management and a member of the Supervisory Board of Vodafone Ukraine.
According to the release, Lavrenchuk also chaired the Nomination and Remuneration Committee, while the Risk and Compliance Committee was chaired by independent Supervisory Board member Elizabeth Nelson, who was Vice President of Risk Management and Compliance, Chief Risk Officer at the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development in 2012-2019.
Her colleague Juan Enrique Pérez Calota chaired the Audit Committee, while Oleksandr Rodnyansky, a member of the Supervisory Board and representative of the President of Ukraine, became the chairman of the Strategy and Transformation Committee.
Oschad reminded that as a result of the renewal of the Supervisory Board’s composition among independent members provided for by the current legislation, four financial market experts – Michal Krupinski, Lavrenchuk, Nelson and Philip Heasley – joined the Supervisory Board, while Perez Kalota and Anton Pyatigin retained their seats on the Supervisory Board.
In addition, the Supervisory Board also includes three government representatives – Yulia Pashko from the Verkhovna Rada Committee, Rosa Tapanova from the Cabinet of Ministers, and Rodnyansky from the President of Ukraine.
According to the National Bank of Ukraine, as of September 1, 2023, Oschadbank ranked second in terms of total assets (UAH 337.99 billion) among the 64 operating banks in the country and first in terms of the number of branches – 1182.
In January-June 2023, PJSC Ukrnafta made a net profit of UAH 14.1 billion, the company’s CEO Sergiy Koretsky posted on Facebook on Tuesday morning.
“Net profit for the first half of 2023 amounted to UAH 14.1 billion. At the moment, net profit has exceeded UAH 20 billion. This is the net profit from business activities, the result after paying all taxes, including income tax. There were no changes in accounting policies,” he said.
According to him, the company’s projected revenue for the current year will be UAH 95 billion, which is twice the average annual revenue over the past decade.
“And the rise in oil prices has nothing to do with it. It’s a transparent market work without intermediaries,” emphasized Koretsky.
The Ukrnafta CEO also clarified that the company paid UAH 12.3 billion in taxes in the first half of the year, including UAH 3.3 billion in income tax. The plan for tax payments for the whole of 2023 is UAH 27 billion, including about UAH 5 billion of income tax.
“For example, over the past 10 years, we have paid UAH 12 billion in income tax. Accordingly, in 2023 alone, the company will transfer five times more money to the state budget than it was on average in 2012-2021,” he wrote.
At the same time, based on the results of its business activities this year, the company is preparing to pay at least UAH 6 billion in dividends if the shareholders’ meeting decides to pay a minimum rate of 30%, which even then will be more than the total result of the last 10 years.
“Ukrnafta is Ukraine’s largest oil producer and operator of a national network of 537 filling stations, of which 456 are in operation. The company is implementing a comprehensive program to restore operations and update the format of its filling stations. Since February 2023, Ukrnafta has been issuing its own fuel coupons and NAFTAKarta cards, which are sold to legal entities and individuals through Ukrnafta-Postach LLC.
Ukrnafta’s largest shareholder is Naftogaz of Ukraine with a 50%+1 share. On November 5, 2022, the Supreme Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces of Ukraine decided to transfer to the state a share of corporate rights of the company owned by private owners, which is currently managed by the Ministry of Defense. In November 2022, Serhiy Koretskyi was appointed director of the company.
In January-September 2023, “Nadiina” Insurance Company (Kyiv) collected insurance premiums in the amount of UAH 99.575 million, which is 1.68% more than in the same period last year.
Such data was published in the information of RA Standard Rating on the update of the company’s credit rating/financial strength (reliability) rating at uaA+ on the national scale.
At the same time, premiums from individuals amounted to UAH 0.501 million, and premiums from reinsurers amounted to UAH 2 thousand. Thus, according to the results of nine months of 2023, the insurer’s client portfolio in terms of gross premiums was mainly formed by legal entities.
Insurance payments sent to reinsurers in the first nine months of 2023 decreased by 33.68% to UAH 55.145 million compared to the same period in 2022. Thus, the ratio of reinsurers’ participation in insurance premiums decreased from 84.91% to 55.38%, or by 29.53 percentage points.
The insurer’s net written premiums increased by 3.01 times to UAH 44.430 million, and earned premiums by 3.55 times to UAH 44.086 million.
The volume of insurance payments and reimbursements made by the company in the first nine months of 2023 compared to the same period in 2022 increased by 3.04 times to UAH 5.721 million. Thus, the payout ratio increased by 3.83 p.p. to 5.75%.
Profit from operating activities in January-September 2023 increased to UAH 27.042 million, and the insurer’s net profit increased to UAH 25.198 million.
As of September 30, 2023, the insurer’s assets increased by 46.66% to UAH 89.159 million, equity showed an increase of 51.33% to UAH 74.284 million, liabilities – by 27.07% to UAH 14.875 million, cash and cash equivalents increased 2.87 times to UAH 38.415 million.
As reported, the company was registered in the Unified State Register of Legal Entities and Individual Entrepreneurs in 2006. The authorized capital is UAH 15 million.
According to the NSSMC, as of the fourth quarter of 2022, the company’s shareholders were eight individuals with 9.5%, one with 5%, and another with 19%.
Lviv Bank plans to increase its authorized capital by UAH 250 million, or 35.3%, to UAH 958 million 405,338 thousand through additional contributions from existing shareholders.
According to the bank’s announcement in the disclosure system of the National Securities and Stock Market Commission (NSSMC), the relevant issue was submitted to an extraordinary remote shareholders’ meeting on December 18.
It is assumed that an additional issue of shares with the existing par value of UAH 0.1 each will be made as part of the authorized capital increase.
According to the National Bank of Ukraine, as of the beginning of September 2023, Lviv Bank ranked 28th in terms of assets (UAH 9.12 billion) among 64 banks operating in the country. The bank’s net profit for 8 months of this year amounted to UAH 121.1 million.
According to the website of Lviv Bank, its shareholders at the beginning of this year were: ResponsAbility Participations (Switzerland) – 48.557189%, Nordic Environment Finance Corporation (NEFCO) – 13.93623% and Icelandic citizen Margeir Petursson – 37.4692%.
The EBRD pointed out in August this year that Bank Lviv, which is owned by European shareholders, is a regional bank focused on SMEs and one of the fastest growing in western Ukraine, with a loan portfolio that grew from $35 million in 2017 to $133 million in the first quarter of 2023. The bank is headquartered in Lviv and has a network of 19 branches, 13 of which are in Lviv region and six in other cities.
Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine has virtually eliminated the demand for foreign currency loans, contributing to a reorientation to lending in the national currency, which is a good indicator for the economy, according to Pervin Dadashova, director of the NBU’s Financial Stability Department.
“Hryvnia lending prevails, and in general, in principle, the hryvnia is more attractive for lending than foreign currency. This is very important, and I think that this love for lending in hryvnia should continue,” she said at a discussion held by the Center for Economic Strategies (CES).
Dadashova noted that earlier the main motivation for foreign currency lending was lower interest rates on such loans, which led to problems in the absence of real needs and revenues in foreign currency. According to her, the risks of foreign currency lending, which increased during the war, have sharply reduced business interest in the dumb
The Director of the NBU’s Financial Stability Department noted that the loan portfolio has recently stabilized and returned to a slight increase, and now banks are faced with the task of compensating for its loss during the war, which, according to various metrics, amounted to about 15%.
“Now the quality of the loan portfolio is absolutely normal, it is even better than before the war. That is, banks are not losing as much credit risk as they did a few months ago,” the expert emphasized.
She clarified that the small growth in the loan portfolio so far is largely due to the growth under government support programs.
“However, a greater openness to new lending is already noticeable, including in our surveys,” Dadashova noted.
Among other trends, she noted an increase in the share of small and medium-sized businesses (SMEs) in the loan portfolio to more than 50%.
“A significant part of them belongs to business groups, so it is not a pure small business, it is still a big business, but it is structured in a certain way. But in the total portfolio, 15% of loans are granted to debtors who do not belong to business groups,” the expert said, emphasizing that they are a “good engine” for market lending.
