Ukraine’s government has reduced the gas price for the population. State oil and gas company Naftogaz must now sell gas to the Ukrainian public and heating companies for the same price it buys it from the Dutch gas hub, Title Transfer Facility. Naftogaz can only add 1.9% above this price, according to the Jan. 24 decree published by the Cabinet of Ministers. The government aims to “safeguard the interests of the general public within the process of the natural gas market functioning.”
The Embassy of Ukraine to China insists Ukrainians leave the country. Due to the outbreak of the new coronavirus, the embassy is even considering evacuating Ukrainian citizens who are currently in areas of China most affected by the virus – in the province of Hubei, which is partly quarantined. Ukraine’s Foreign Ministry says it’s monitoring the situation closely and working in cooperation with the Chinese healthcare authorities, Interfax-Ukraine reports.
The Ukrainian currency, the hryvnia, has depreciated. The NBU decreased the currency exchange rate to Hr 24.6 per $1 on Jan. 28, a 0.27 kopeck decrease as compared to the rate of Jan. 27. Starting in January 2019, the hryvnia started to depreciate, according to the central bank. The value of the hryvnia against the euro has also dropped to Hr 27.12 per 1 euro. Yesterday it was Hr 26.84 per 1 euro.
Ukraine’s sovereign debt falls from 61% to 50% of gross domestic product. The Finance Ministry reports that Ukraine’s sovereign debt has fallen by 7.84% down to Hr 1.998 trillion. This means that the nation’s debt has decreased by Hr 170 billion. However, in dollar terms, Ukraine’s sovereign debt grew by 7.7% – by $6 billion – to $84.4 billion. The Finance Ministry reports that such fluctuations are due to the steady appreciation of Ukraine’s currency hryvnia in 2019.
Ukraine’s largest television broadcasting firms start to encrypt their signals. Detector Media reports that TV broadcasters such as 1+1 Media, StarLightMedia, Inter Media Group, and Media Group Ukraine are starting to encrypt their signals for satellite broadcasting. According to Novoye Vremya, the encryption is to start late on Jan. 28, but the broadcasters have declined to comment on the exact time.
Owners of online retailer Rozetka obtain National Bank of Ukraine (NBU) license for electronic payments. The license allows them to process payment services, according to the National Bank of Ukraine. According to YouControl, it was UAPROM LLC that obtained the license, and the company belongs to Vladyslav Chechetkin and Iryna Chechetkina, the co-founders of Rozetka.
Ukraine’s Supreme Court rules in Bank Mykhailivsky case. According to Ukraine’s Deposit Guarantee Fund, the court rejected decisions by lower courts that declared the transfer of rights of claim to the bank’s loans as legal. Back in 2016, Bank Mykhailivsky transferred the claims on its loans to two financial companies — Pleyada and Fagor — right before it went bust. Until recently, both Pleyada and Fagor have been trying to recover the funds received by borrowers through 111,000 loans from the bank. The companies now have no right to collect money from the borrowers. However, the case will be reconsidered by the court of first instance, the Supreme Court ruled on Jan. 16.
Ukraine will start constructing three river bridges and nine ring roads in 2020. State road operator Ukravtodor intends to start building bridges in Kremenchuk, Mykolayiv, and Zaporizhia in 2020, according to UNIAN news agency. Japan International Cooperation Agency is prepared to shoulder most of the costs for constructing the bridge in Mykolayiv. “Ukrainian cities have to get rid of transit traffic as this decreases the number of traffic jams and improves the transit potential of the road networks,” said Oleksandr Kurbakov, the CEO of Ukravtodor. In 2020, Ukravtodor will also invest in building bypass roads around Berehove, Dnipro, Dunayivtsi, Kobelyaky, Lviv, Poltava, Rivne, Ternopil, and Zhytomyr.
