Ovostar Union Agro Group, one of Ukraine’s leading egg and egg products producers, cut egg production by 2% to 362 million eggs in the first quarter of 2023, but was able to significantly boost exports of products with a significant increase in prices compared to last year, according to an operational report on the Warsaw Stock Exchange on Thursday.
“Management has taken all steps to minimize the adverse effects on the current production situation, which made it possible to maintain production and sales at the prewar level,” Boris Belikov, the company’s CEO, said in the report.
According to him, the range of products and distribution channels have been reviewed and brought in line with current market needs, and in general, taking into account the circumstances, the results of the group in the first quarter of 2023 can be considered satisfactory.
It is pointed out that the number of laying hens decreased by 2% in the first quarter of 2023 compared to one year ago, including a 6.2% decrease to 7.12 million and 6.38 million laying hens, respectively.
Sales in the egg segment rose 4% to 241 million, including export sales jumped 3.9 times to 105 million, and their share rose from 11% to 44%.
The average price of eggs rose 56% to $0.139/egg during the reporting period, according to the report.
According to the report, the volume of processed eggs in Q1 2023 remained at the level of the previous year – 92 million eggs: 406 tons of dry and 3,073 thousand tons of liquid egg products were produced, compared to respectively 561 tons and 2,131 tons in the first quarter of last year.
Sales of dry egg products increased to 531 tons from 429 tons in the first quarter of 2022. Exports increased to 354 tons, or 67%, from 238 tons, or 55%.
Sales of liquid egg products rose to 3,063,000 tons from 2,182,000 tons, including exports of 1,291,000 tons versus 728 tons, increasing its share to 42% from 33%.
As with eggs, the average price of egg products for the year increased significantly: dry – by 32%, to $ 8.79 / kg, liquid – by 44%, to $ 2.66 / kg (all prices are excluding VAT).
Taking into account these sales figures and prices, the total revenues of the three product categories in the first quarter of this year can be estimated at $46.3 million, up 68.1% as compared to $27.6 million in the first quarter of last year.
The group’s holding company, Ovostar Union N.V. – in mid-June 2011, it floated 25% of its shares on the WSE and raised $33.2 mln. Its majority stake is owned by Prime One Capital Limited, which is controlled by its chief executive B. Belikov and chairman of the board Vitaliy Veresenko.
In 2022, Ovostar reportedly reduced egg production by 9% to 1.55 billion eggs and sales by 6% to 1.08 billion eggs.
Sales of dry egg products over the past year decreased by one-third to 2.13 thousand tons, liquid – by 26%, to 10.62 thousand tons.
Insurance company Unives (Kyiv) in January-March 2023 collected UAH 1.223 mln of net premiums, which is 9.4 times less than during the same period of 2022. As it is reported in the interim report of the company, placed in the information disclosure system of NSCE, its gross premiums for this period amounted to UAH 144 ths, while during the same period a year earlier it was UAH 6,769 mln. UAH 2 ths was ceded in reinsurance.
The company paid out UAH 1,011 mln in the first three months, which is 3,1 times less than in the same period a year ago.
The company’s administrative costs amounted to UAH 833 th (-18.8%), while sales expenses amounted to UAH 110 th.
Net profit decreased 4,8 times- to UAH 2,121 mln.
IC Unives works in the insurance market of Ukraine since 2003. It is a part of the financial group “Unives”. It specializes in risk insurance. It has 17 licenses for obligatory and voluntary types of insurance.
The authorized capital of the company amounts to UAH 50 mln.
Czech President Petr Pavel together with Slovak President Zuzana Chaputova arrived in Ukraine on a visit.
“With Zuzana Chaputova, we both understand the value of freedom and justice. It is hard to see with our own eyes that Ukrainians are paying the highest price for it. With the blood and lives of its citizens. In fighting the aggressor, he defends what we have in common. That’s why we will support them,” Pavel wrote on Twitter, showing a picture with the president of Slovakia in front of the destroyed building.
For its part, the Czech media outlet Denikn reported that the Slovak president and her Czech counterpart Petr Pavel arrived in Kiev early this morning.
This is the first visit of the Czech head of state to Ukraine since 2013.
Pavel and Chaputova will meet with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky and Prime Minister Denys Shmygal, and will also visit cities liberated from Russian occupation near the capital.
A meeting with Crimean Tatar representatives Mustafa Dzhemiliev and Refat Chubarov is also scheduled.
Chaputova also later tweeted about the joint visit to Ukraine.
“Our first joint visit abroad with Peter Paul to Ukraine with a message of friendship, solidarity and support. Slovakia, the Czech Republic and Ukraine share parts of a common history – and we also share our common future,” she stressed.
The Czech TV channel ČT24 reported that the Czech and Slovak presidents visited Irpen, then went to Borodyanka. In addition, the Czech president then headed to Bucha.
Businessman Yegor Levchenko promises real payments for drug traffickers and a clear plan to combat illegal distribution. He is the man behind the high-profile campaign “Catch a drug dealer – get cash“.
The campaign starts on May 1, when the entire system goes live.
Levchenko told blogger Stas Dombrovsky about who he will pay money to and how he plans to defeat the drug business in Ukraine.
“I have nothing to do with politics or the government,” said Levchenko in the interview. He is currently doing business abroad and has the opportunity to finance projects for Ukraine.
“I have nothing to do with politics or the government as such. By the way, I’ve talked about my business before, and it’s focused purely on the IT sector. It is a network of companies in different countries. We are engaged in lead generation – in simple terms, attracting customers for our clients. We attract traffic to a variety of websites, mainly betting and casinos. We are also engaged in traffic arbitrage – for small lead generation companies, we work as a “filter” – we resell the traffic generated by them for clients. And so on,” Levchenko said in his first detailed interview.
For several months, while the announcement of the “Catch the Huckster” campaign was making the rounds across the country, its initiator and main sponsor remained in the shadows. Today, Yegor Levchenko says he is ready to finance the campaign as long as it takes. And as long as the performance of the Department for Combating Drugs does not at least double.
“I’m not going to hide my soul, I’m doing this for the country and for myself. I am tired of hearing that I am involved in the drug trade. With this action, I want to show that I am ready not only to refute this nonsense, but also to eradicate this plague. And yes, I am ready to take such radical and expensive measures as the “catch the huckster” campaign,” Levchenko told Stas Dombrovsky. The businessman assures that there is no limit to the amount of money he is willing to invest in the campaign. And he immediately revealed the details of how the whole scheme will work.
The promotion will start on May 1. Participants will be able to earn money and play the so-called “roulette”. One thousand dollars will be awarded to the person who helps catch a pawnbroker or trafficker who is found by the police to be in possession of drugs in “particularly large amounts.” The smaller the seized weight, the smaller the payout. The next step is five hundred dollars, and for even smaller amounts, two hundred dollars. Levchenko has already posted a table of what is considered “large” and “especially large” amounts by law on the website.
The money will be paid in hryvnia, at the NBU exchange rate at the time of detention. To do this, anyone can come to the nearest police station and write a statement against the pawnbroker or trafficker they have found. The organizers of the action then need to provide a copy of the statement, a video of the moment it was written in the police station, and an extract from the URPTI on the initiation of criminal proceedings.
As soon as the pawnbroker is taken in, Levchenko says, the participant will immediately receive money from the Fund.
It will not be possible to make money with the help of fakes, the businessman warned. A staff of lawyers will strictly check all information.
There are special conditions for those who are ready to hand over a drug production laboratory. The organizers of “Catch the Huckster” are targeting large laboratories that produce ten kilograms or more of illegal substances. In an interview with Dombrovsky, the patron promises ten thousand dollars for a laboratory that produces ten to thirty kilograms of drugs. For volumes of thirty kilograms or more, he will pay twenty-five thousand dollars.
Levchenko invited police officers to participate in the campaign. They can do it unofficially through their friends, Levchenko says. But he still expects the main attention to come from the police authorities and large cities. All actions of the participants and organizers will be exclusively within the law, the philanthropist said. The organizers of the “Catch a Bribe” campaign are ready to work under round-the-clock law enforcement supervision.
At the same time, Levchenko is confident that his experience and ideas can actually not only help fight the spread of dangerous drugs, but also actually minimize the trade. “I am sure that officials and the leadership of the National Police and the State Service of Ukraine for Health and Safety will notice our action and realize that there is no fraud or scam here. I would like them to start cooperating with us. I have specific ideas that, if implemented as a whole, with our campaign and the work of the police, could, in a fairly short time, if not eradicate the problem completely, then deal a serious blow to both trade and production. It is possible, I know how to do it.”
Asia-Pacific stock indexes are mostly rising on Friday, the exception is the South Korean indicator.
Traders are assessing the statistical data and the results of the Bank of Japan meeting.
The Japanese Central Bank left unchanged the main parameters of the monetary policy (MP) on the results of the two-day meeting that ended on Friday, which became the first for the new head of the Central Bank Kazuo Ueda.
The short-term interest rate on commercial bank deposits at the Central Bank remained at minus 0.1% per annum, the target yield on ten-year government bonds – about zero, according to a statement from the Japanese Central Bank.
Bank of Japan also retained the range within which the yield of ten-year government bonds may fluctuate – plus/minus 0.5%.
At the same time, the phrase about the Central Bank’s intention to keep the rate at the current level or lower was missing from the text of the statement on the results of the meeting. This is a phrase the Bank of Japan has been repeating since October 2019.
At the same time, the central bank reiterated that it is ready to keep its stimulative policy until inflation stabilizes at the 2% target level.
In addition, the Bank of Japan announced its intention to revise its monetary policy, the results of which will be published in 12-18 months.
Statistics released Friday showed a 13th straight month of improvement in the country’s retail sales, as well as an increase in industrial production and an unexpected jump in unemployment.
Japan’s Nikkei 225 stock index gained 1% in trading. Toyota Motor gained 1.3 percent, SoftBank Group gained 2.3 percent and Denso Corp. – Denso Corp. by 4.3%, Daikin Industries by 2.8% and Ana Holdings by 2.2%.
China’s Shanghai Composite stock index added 0.7 percent in trading Friday, while Hong Kong’s Hang Seng gained 0.6 percent.
The leaders of the growth both in mainland China and Hong Kong are shares of technology companies, rising due to strong quarterly reports of U.S. IT-giants.
Kunlun Tech soared almost 20% in trading in Shenzhen. Shares of BlueFocus Intelligent gained 17%, Dawning Information Industry gained 5.2%, and 360 Security Technology gained 4.8%.
In Hong Kong, shares of BYD Electronic (+6.7%), Haier Smart Home (+5.9%), Semiconductor Manufacturing International (+2%), NetEase Inc. (SPB: NTES) (+3.2%) gained.
The value of China Tourism Duty Free Corp. securities fell 0.15% during trading. The company’s net income fell 10% in the first quarter as its expenses grew faster than revenue.
Australia’s S&P/ASX 200 is adding 0.24% and South Korea’s KOSPI is losing 0.02%.
South Korean industrial production fell 7.6% in March compared to the same month last year. In February the index decreased by 8%.
Agroton Agrarian Group now controls the property and 5 thousand hectares of land bank in Kharkiv region out of 110 thousand hectares in Kharkiv and Luhansk regions that were previously under cultivation, the group reported on the Warsaw Stock Exchange.
According to the report, Agroton is currently involved in clearing farmland and preparing for spring field work.
As noted, the company has no control over the property and land in the occupied Luhansk region, so its employees have left.
The management of the agroholding promises to provide shareholders with reports on all requirements after the end of the war in Ukraine.
“Agroton” has been working in the Ukrainian market since 1992 and before the full-scale Russian military invasion it specialized in growing grains and oilseeds, producing and selling livestock products. The land bank of Agroton before the war was about 110 thousand hectares in Lugansk and Kharkiv regions. The group owns two poultry farms in Lugansk region.
“Agroton” reported in 2022 that representatives of the so-called “LNR” and OJSC “Agrocomplex named after N.I. Tkachev” (Russian Federation) “seized” all the assets of its parent company Agroton Public Limited in the Luhansk region on May 21, 2022. The management of the group applied to the law enforcement bodies of Ukraine with a request for a legal assessment and bringing to justice those involved in the seizure of its property.
According to the Luhansk Regional Military Administration, Russian occupants with the participation of collaborators – citizens of Ukraine stole 20 thousand tons of grain from “Agroton” elevators, as well as collected from its fields and exported to Russia 200 thousand tons of crop 2022. In addition, the invaders stole 40 vehicles to Russia.
