Head of the Office of the President of Ukraine Andriy Yermak discussed with diplomats the implementation of Ukraine’s Peace Formula, the press service of the Office of the President has said.
More than 70 representatives of foreign states took part on the seventh meeting on the issue dedicated to the Food Security item of the formula that took place in the territory of a bread company in Kyiv region. The enterprise was hit by one of Russia’s missile attacks last year.
Yermak said that in Africa alone 32 countries depend on Ukrainian grain export. He thanked the partners for ensuring the operation of the grain corridor in the Black Sea and for their support for the Grain from Ukraine humanitarian initiative proposed by President of Ukraine Volodymyr Zelenskyy, which is aimed at delivering grain to the most vulnerable African countries.
“We understand how important it is to help people on other countries that also suffer from the war and the same aggressor as the citizens of Ukraine,” Yermak said.
He thanked the foreign diplomats for their active involvement in the working groups on each of the items of the Peace Formula. Yermak recalled that the working groups are preparing the framework documents on each item of the formula that will contain detailed steps for the restoration of fair and sustainable peace in Ukraine and will be universal for any country.
According to Yermak, joint developments of the working groups will be used as a basis for the upcoming third meeting at the level of national security advisors. The decisions developed during these consultations will be submitted for consideration to the heads of states and governments at the Global Peace Summit.
Metinvest mining and metallurgical group will invest in a logistics center in Poland in order to increase the supply of Ukrainian metal products for export, the company’s CEO Yuriy Ryzhenkov said in an interview with the leading Polish business publication Business Insider.
According to him, Zaporizhstal and Kamet Steel are currently operating at 65-70% and 75% of their capacity, respectively. About 25% of products are sold on the domestic market, the rest goes mainly to the EU. At the same time, steel is sold mainly in neighboring countries, such as Poland, Slovakia, the Czech Republic, Romania, and Bulgaria.
The company also sells metal products to Italy, Germany or France.
“Steel mills can hardly complain about the low level of sales, but iron ore enterprises were less fortunate. Here, in addition to domestic consumption, China was also a buyer. However, in the current situation, exports there are practically impossible, since the Black Sea ports are blocked, therefore, the border countries of the EU also remain buyers here. Iron ore enterprises now use about 35-40% of their capacity. We tried to send raw materials to China through Romanian and Polish ports. However, unfortunately, the economy of this logistics simply does not work in the current market,” the top manager said.
He noted that at the same time, the coal production of the company in Ukraine operates at 100% capacity. The mined coal is supplied to the group’s coking enterprises in Ukraine, and is also sold on the local market. The rest is sold abroad, mainly in Slovakia and Poland.
“In 2022, our steel production decreased by 69% compared to last year. This affected a number of financial indicators. For example, our profit in 2022 is 54% less than last year,” the CEO said.
He also stated that Metinvest’s strategy has not changed – the company wanted to connect Ukraine and Ukrainian iron ore with the European steel production chain. Therefore, the group continues to look for opportunities to acquire assets that would allow it to use the Ukrainian raw material base, produce products in the EU and supply them to European consumers.
The National Bank of Ukraine (NBU) has revoked the licenses of Financial Company No. 1 LLC, which ranked 97th in terms of market revenue in the first half of this year.
“The said financial company does not comply with the legal requirements for maintaining the minimum amount of equity capital. This negatively affects its real and potential financial capabilities, in particular, the level of liquidity, solvency, financial stability, and working capital (equity),” the regulator explained its actions on its website.
According to the NBU, the decision was made by the Committee for Supervision and Regulation of Non-Banking Financial Services Markets on August 28 and came into force on August 29.
According to the NBU, Financial Company No. 1 finished the first half of this year with revenues of UAH 14.9 million and a net loss of UAH 7.96 million.
In terms of labor costs (UAH 1.23 million), FC “No. 1” was 87th in the market in the first half of the year, and 403rd in terms of assets (UAH 15.1 million).
According to OpenDataBot, Financial Company No. 1 LLC was founded in August 2013 by Andriy Stepanenko, co-owner of four IT-related companies (IT Nonstop, Finayti, IT Finance, 24. IT) with a registered capital of UAH 8 million.
The Ministry of Community Development, Territories and Infrastructure (MCDI) has signed a protocol with the Norwegian Ministry of Transport on “transport visa-free travel”, which will allow cargo transportation without permits.
“Previously, Ukrainian cargo carriers, regardless of the class of environmental friendliness of vehicles, could travel to Norway only with a permit. Now for trucks of Euro-5 standard and above is introduced permit-free passage”, – are quoted in the message on the government portal the words of the Deputy head of the Ministry of transportation Sergey Derkach.
The simplified regime begins to operate on September 1 and will apply to both bilateral and transit traffic.
It is specified that this liberalization of freight traffic is introduced at least until June 30, 2024.
As for vehicles of low class of environmental friendliness, as noted by the Ministry of Transport, during the meeting it was possible to agree on permits for the next year. “Ukrainian carriers will be able to get 250 universal permits and 50 – from/to third countries,” the ministry said.
Ukrainian carriers have been able to work in the zheimme of “trnasportnaya bezviz” with the EU countries since last year. In June 2023, Ukraine agreed on the same regime for road freight transportation with Northern Macedonia.
Vodafone Ukraine, the second largest mobile operator in Ukraine, has announced that it has acquired a 90.6% stake in the authorized capital of Frinet LLC, which provides fixed-line Internet access services under the O3 brand, for UAH 746 million.
“The corresponding payment of UAH 746 million was made on the day of the Share Purchase Agreement. The transaction has been completed and registered in accordance with the current legislation,” the company said in its interim consolidated financial report published on its website on Tuesday.
The acquisition of Freenet LLC is part of the group’s strategy to develop converged services and tariffs.
The company also announced the payment of UAH 1.8 billion of outstanding debt to Telco Solutions and Investments LLC on August 9.
In addition, the company announced the payment of semi-annual interest to Eurobond holders in August in the amount of $12.4 million (UAH 453.3 million).
The text of the financial report emphasizes that as of June 30, 2023, Vodafone Ukraine was in compliance with all debt covenants. At the same time, the company remains concerned about the moratorium on cross-border currency payments, which may cause difficulties with the repayment of $400 million of Eurobonds in February 2025. In this regard, the company’s management is considering several options in case the moratorium remains in force, including refinancing with financial institutions, negotiations on changing the terms of the bonds with the Eurobond holders, and the introduction of additional measures to manage and control outflows to maximize debt repayment costs.
Earlier, VF Ukraine (Vodafone Ukraine) announced the completion of the acquisition of Frinet LLC, a national broadband Internet access operator providing services in Kyiv, Dnipropetrovs’k, Zhytomyr, Zaporizhzhya, Ivano-Frankivsk, Lviv, Kyiv, Rivne, Khmelnytsky and Chernihiv regions with 163 thousand subscribers.
The company has been operating in the market since 2008 and builds its networks using FTTx and GPON technology with 10 and 40 gigabit fiber optic trunks and modern managed equipment from leading manufacturers, which allows it to provide subscribers with Internet access channels with speeds up to 1 Gbps.
“Vodafone Ukraine provides 3G and 4G high-speed Internet and fixed-line services, mobile communications, and develops the Internet of Things (IoT), technologies and solutions for Smart City, big data analysis, financial and technological services, and cloud services. Since 2019, the company has been part of the NEQSOL Holding group of companies owned by businessman Nasib Hasanov.
NEQSOL Holding operates in the oil and gas, telecommunications, construction, and other high-tech sectors in the UK, USA, Turkey, Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan, UAE, and Bangladesh. The group entered the telecommunications industry in the early 2000s.
On Wednesday, the share price of Astarta, Ukraine’s largest sugar producer, rose by 4.55% to PLN34.5 per share ($8.43 at the current exchange rate) on the Warsaw Stock Exchange after the publication of its half-year report with good financial results.
According to the stock exchange’s website, after closing the day before at PLN33 and the report published in the evening, trading on Wednesday started at PLN35 and reached PLN36 in the first minutes, but within an hour it corrected to PLN33.3, after which it gradually grew without such swings.
According to the report, in the first half of 2023, Astarta earned EUR54.73 million in net profit, up 97.4% compared to the first half of 2022, with revenue up 31.6% to EUR287.25 million and EBITDA up 42.7% to EUR97.25 million.
Net financial debt decreased from EUR43 million to EUR19 million over the half-year after repayment of bank debt, and net debt decreased from EUR152 million to EUR130 million.
A total of 329 deals were made on the day for almost PLN1.23 million. The rate corresponds to a capitalization of PLN862.5 million.
As for Kernel, where minority shareholders are awaiting the results of the additional issue for fear of dilution of their stake, their share price on Wednesday fell by only 0.1%, which was enough to drop below the PLN11 level to PLN10.99 per share for the first time in the company’s history.
