Moscow press review for August 16, 2012
MOSCOW. Aug 16 (Interfax) - The following is a digest of Moscow newspapers published on Aug 16. Interfax does not accept liability for information in these stories.
POLITICS & ECONOMICS
The Finance Ministry is confident that Russia will manage to turn Moscow into an international financial center relatively quickly, according to its road map for the financial center. The ministry is betting on privatization and pension savings (Vedomosti, p. 1).
Russian industrial production growth unexpectedly accelerated to 3.4% year-on-year in July and moved back into positive territory month-on-month, driven by manufacturing, construction and the automotive industry, Rosstat reported. However, business activity indicators tell a slightly different story, that industry is still balancing between growth and decline, preparing for a possible slump in consumer demand (Vedomosti, p. 3; Kommersant, p. 2).
Interview: Russian Agriculture Minister Nikolai Fyodorov (Vedomosti, p. 5).
Interview: Maxim Reshetnikov, Director of Moscow's Economic Policy and Development Department (Kommersant, p. 1).
OIL & GAS
State oil major Rosneft was not bluffing when it announced on Tuesday that its president Igor Sechin had been elected chairman of Rosneftegaz. The prime minister's order for the appointment exists. However, it was not signed by Dmitry Medvedev, but by Vladimir Putin a day before he moved back to the Kremlin in May (Vedomosti, p. 7).
Ukraine has opened its resources to global oil and gas majors, tapping a consortium led by ExxonMobil to develop an offshore block in the Black Sea. The change in Ukraine's strategy is due to gas contract disputes with Russia, and the ultimate goal is to stop importing Russian gas, analysts believe (Vedomosti, p. 3).
UTILITIES
Interview: Fulvio Conti, CEO of Italy's Enel (Kommersant, p. 10).
METALS & MINING
Planetary Resources, the U.S. firm that plans to mine water, platinum and gold on asteroids, has received its first investment from Russia. I2BF Global Ventures has invested money from one of its funds in the company, managing partner Ilya Golubovich said (Vedomosti, p. 1).
BANKING, FINANCE & INSURANCE
VTB, Russia's second largest bank, posted a net loss of 2.7 billion rubles for July, and saw net profit for the first seven months of 2012 drop nearly 60% to 15.95 billion rubles, data posted on the Central Bank's website show. VTB saw a dramatic deterioration in the quality of its loan portfolio and outflow of corporate funds in July, which it replaced with more expensive government budget money (Kommersant, p. 8).
REAL ESTATE & CONSTRUCTION
The Moscow authorities have cancelled and approved about the same amount of construction projects since the beginning of 2011 - about 10 million square meters. However, the geography has changed, and now there are no more major development projects in the city center (Vedomosti, p. 7).
TELECOMMUNICATIONS, MEDIA & TECHNOLOGY
Altimo, the telecoms arm of Russia's Alfa Group, announced Wednesday that it has bought 14.8% of voting shares in Vimpelcom Ltd. From Egyptian billionaire Naguib Sawiris' Weather Investments II for $3.6 billion, increasing its stake in the mobile services provider to 40.5%. Altimo hopes to also buy out Weather's remaining 3.5% stake in Vimpelcom, calling on rival shareholder Telenor to give up its option to this stake (Kommersant, p. 1; Vedomosti, p. 1).
Vimpelcom has become the first of the four winners of July's tender for 4G frequencies to announce network construction plans. The operator plans to launch LTE services in Moscow in early 2013 (Kommersant, p. 7).
TRANSPORTATION
Russian government officials are discussing the possibility of selling 25% of shares in Russian Railways (RZD) in an IPO on the London Stock Exchange as early as by the end of 2013. RZD president Vladimir Yakunin, however, said this could happen in 2015 or 2016 (Vedomosti, p. 8).
AUTOMOTIVE & ENGINEERING
The general director of the Khrunichev Space Center, Vladimir Nesterov has submitted his resignation, following the recent loss of two telecommunication satellites due to an engine malfunction on the carrier rocket. This will be the Federal Space Agency's first opportunity to test out its 'space reserve' of professions who could replace the current heads of companies in the industry (Kommersant, p. 1).
The Federal Anti-Monopoly Service has, for technical reasons, cancelled the controversial tender for a contract to supply low-floor trams to Moscow worth 9 billion rubles. Two bidders, state-owned Uralvagonzavod and the Sinara group, also tried to stop the tender, but the regulator found their claims unfounded. Moscow will now have to clarify the specifications for the trams and call a new tender (Kommersant, p. 7).
