Anew exchange in Kyiv
The Kyiv City State Administration (KMDA) plans to create its own exchange for investment tenders, and hold over 20 investment tenders by the end of 2010, the Deputy Chairman of the KMDA Ruslan Kramarenko informed. “Now we are working to obtain a license and register our exchange. By the end of the year we intend to hold more than 20 investment tenders, including ones for the construction of surface and underground parking lots, for which we are already preparing 12 plots,” he said. According to Kramarenko, the KMDA leadership intends to conduct investment tenders “as openly as possible, with live television broadcasting.” The KMDA’s Deputy Chairman also said that out of 106 investment tenders held by the city over the last three years, the implementation of 105 had not even started. “We are now finishing the analysis of investment contracts, but it is already clear that nobody tried to attract real investors. Competitions were held for the city-affiliated companies, which were later to attract real investments (at least in theory). Calls for proposals were published in the newspaper, which were either not printed at all, or completely bought. As a result, public property and land passed into private hands for pitiful sums,” he explained. The city intends to dissolve such contracts, according to the official, and it will not finance those projects.
Uranium enrichment venture
Russia and Ukraine are discussing the creation of a joint venture focused on uranium enrichment, announced Sergei Kirienko, Chairman of the State Corporation Rosatom. “For such a big nuclear power producer, it is extremely important to have guaranteed access to uranium enrichment services”, said Kirienko. He said the joint venture with Ukraine will be set up in a similar manner to the joint venture which is being set up with Kazakhstan. Let’s recall that the latter venture will be based in Russia. NAC Kazatomprom, through the joint venture named JSC Uranium Enrichment Centre (UEC) with Russian Tekhsnabexport, will buy a stake in Russia’s largest uranium enrichment enterprise JSC Ural Electrochemical Plant (UEP). It is assumed that the Russian-Kazakh venture will buy the plant’s products (uranium enrichment services) based on long-term contracts at prices matching the prices of supplies sold by the UEP to other buyers. At the same time, the UEC will not be an independent market player. Instead it will be regulated through a corresponding agreement.
Canadian company has views on Ukrainian coal mine
The Canadian Lysander Minerals Corporation attracted 11.5 million dollars in investments to develop the coal mine “Vertical” in Sverdlovsk, Luhansk region, a statement of the company reads. “Our goal is to become one of the largest Ukrainian coal companies,” it declares. Originally Lysander planned to attract only eight million dollars for the development of “Vertical,” but in late September the company revised its plans, increasing the level of investments. According to the company, the proven reserves of the mine amount to 16.2 million tons, with additional projected reserves of 11 million tons, and total resources of 76.2 million tons. The Canadian company intends to extract 30 million tons of coal from the mine over 15 years, with a period of recovery of three to four years. At the same time, the required funding is estimated at 210 million dollars. According to Lysander Minerals’ estimates, the cost of production is around 31.2 dollars per ton. The company also claims that in three to five years “Vertical” will produce 1.4 to 1.5 million tons of coal annually, making it profitable.
