, Interfax-Ukraine reported yesterday. Earlier this year, the Cabinet of Ministers approved sovereign bond guarantees up to $740 million for the state highway agency. The organizers of the issue — J.P. Morgan, Dragon Capital, and Ukreximbank – started calling investors on Tuesday.

 . For comparison, an 8-year, $1.25 billion bond issued by Ukraine six weeks ago – on April 30 — came in at a significantly higher yield — 6.876%.

 Designed to take heavy traffic of fully loaded grain trucks, this network of cement roads will triple in size in three years, Andriy Ivko, said Ukravtodor’s road development director (Interfax-Ukraine).

. After May inflation came in at 9.5% yoy — the second highest in Europe after Turkey’s — most economists interviewed by Bloomberg expected a hike. At two previous meetings – in March and April – the Board of the National Bank of Ukraine hiked the rate. The next meeting is July 22.

 “Inflation is at 9.5% and policy rates only at 7.5%, that is a big negative rate differential…There is a sense also that the Zelensky administration is pulling away from IMF conditionality, so maybe the changes in NBU management made over the past year are finally coming home to roost with a pro growth agenda being rolled out.”

, Kyrylo Shevchenko, the bank’s governor, predicted yesterday. He said: “Inflation will start to slow down in the autumn of this year and will return to the target of 5% in the first half of 2022.”

a growing agricultural sector, a strong hryvnia, and a fading base of comparison with last year’s recession. Ukraine’s currency has gained 5.3% against the dollar this year, making it one of the world’s top performers. Looking at future economic performance, Shevchenko said: “The key risk is still the spread of the COVID-19 pandemic.”

 told Bloomberg yesterday in Warsaw. Under the headline, “Shock CEO Ouster Pushes Ukrainian Gas Giant’s Backer to Brink,” Bloomberg writes: “The EBRD, along with the World Bank, is a key international backer of Naftogaz, helping to give one of Ukraine’s largest companies more financial heft as well as bond-market credibility.”

. On April 30, Ukraine’s Cabinet of Ministers suspended the Naftogaz Supervisory Board and installed Yuriy Vitrenko as CEO. “We were very unhappy and we made that very clear,” Renaud-Basso said. “We hope it’s a one-off, and not a sign of really backtracking in [corporate governance].”

with the Kyiv District Administrative Court to cancel the order issued to him Monday by the National Agency for the Prevention of Corruption to cancel the appoint of Yuriy Vitrenko as Naftogaz CEO. Shmyhal has said the issued should be resolved by the end of next week. The Court says it is reviewing the request.

, says Andriy Prokofiev, head of customer service for Ukraine’s Transmission System Operator. Azeri gas could cross Turkey, then come north to Ukraine through Bulgaria and Romania on the Trans-Balkan pipeline. “The GTS Ukraine operator continues to cooperate with partners from Romania and Moldova on the development of natural gas transportation along the Trans-Balkan route in order to increase import capacity,” he said after a meeting of a Ukrainian-Azerbaijani working group on energy cooperation.

, Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba said after meeting with Central Asian diplomats. Ukraine’s Black Sea ports would be the entry points to Europe and Turkmenbashi port would be the entry to Central Asia. At the same time, Yuriy Vitrenko, Naftogaz CEO, is lobbying the US and the EU to force Gazprom to allow Central Asian gas to flow through Ukraine to the EU.

 the largely Austrian-owned bank said yesterday. “The name of the bank should be simpler, like everything for our clients,” said Board Chairman Oleksandr Pysaruk. In connection with the renaming, the bank said there is no need to contact branches, reissue cards or reissue documents. Founded in 1992, the bank is primarily owned by Vienna’s Raiffeisen Bank International with 68.27% of shares, and the EBRD, with 30%. Ukraine’s largest foreign-owned bank, Raiffeisen has $4.4 billion in assets, 393 branches, 1,800 ATMs,

stemming from 68,000 requests due to flights cancelled because of coronavirus restrictions, the airline reports. Noting that UIA has repaid $41 million since the pandemic started in Europe, UIA said its “communication departments are doing everything possible to process every request as soon as possible.”

reports Yuriy Poguliaiko, head of Volyn Regional Administration. Located in Ukraine’s northwestern corner, these freshwater lakes are famous for their pure, clean, waters.

 The UBN is going to enjoy the long summer weekend in Odesa. We will be back in your email box on Tuesday morning. Have a good weekend! With Best Regards, Jim Brooke

said Kyrylo Tymoshenko, the Deputy Chief of Presidential staff, predicted yesterday at a government forum “Ukraine 30. Economy Without Oligarchs.” Starting prices for three big government corporation sales are: United Mining and Chemical Company, the titanium producer: $138 million; Kyiv’s Bolshevik plant: $50 million; and Kyiv’s President Hotel: $12 million.

United Mining and Chemical Company in August; Azov Shipyard in September; Bolshevik site in October; Hotel President in November, and by December two small Black Sea ports – Belgorod-Dnister and Ust-Dunaisk.

will go on sale in March 2022. Odesa Port Plant, the chemical producer, is to go on sale in April 2022.

, Tymoshenko said yesterday. They are: the Kozatsky on Kyiv’s Maidan, the Vlasta in Lviv and the Bratislava in Kryvy Rih.

. He cited a ski area in Lviv region and a health complex in Vorzel, Kyiv region, which are owned by the State Fiscal Service. He vowed: “Such non-core facilities will be transferred to State Property Fund to be privatized.”

could attract an estimated $500 million in residential and office construction, according to Serhiy Tsivkach, the Executive Director of UkraineInvest.

The Property Fund aims to sell 900 state properties this year, most of them are considered ‘small’ or under $10 million in value. To generate more grass roots support, the Rada is considering a bill to channel 10% of proceeds of auctions to local communities, said Dmitry Sennychenko, Director of the Property Fund.

With each facility estimated to cost $1.5 million, terminals have opened in Chernivtsi, Slavyansk and Vinnytsia. A total of 209 jobs were created. Earlier this year, the privately owned delivery company opened similar centers in Cherkasy and Mykolaiv and doubled its center in Kyiv. Last year, Nova Poshta’s profit rose 27% for $36 million.

said the state postal company. This will make Ukrposhta the fifth largest user of POS terminals in Ukraine. In addition to bringing cashless payments to small towns in Ukraine, the POS terminals allow cardholders to withdraw up to UAH 15,000 ($554) in cash from their postal banking accounts.

Over the last decade, Ukrposhta figures have illustrated that the number of bank branches in Ukraine dropped by 65%, to 7,134. Over the same time, the number of post offices fell by only 22%, to 10,706. In Ukraine, there are nine POS terminals per 1,000 inhabitants, compared to 29 in the EU.

, reports NBC News. In raids on 21 homes in the Kyiv region, police arrested seized computers, luxury cars and $185,000 in cash. The American targets of the Cl0p gang included: Stanford University, University of Colorado, University of Maryland and University of Miami.

 Bloomberg has reported.  However if the three government members of the 6-member Board boycott the meeting, the dismissal would be blocked, wrote Concorde Capital. The Cabinet is opposed to the dismissal and Justice Minister Denys Malyuska says he plans fight the June 15 suspension order by  the National Agency on Corruption Prevention.

, the Economy Ministry has report. Over the investment cycle the project could grow to €1.5 billion, providing jobs for 10,000 workers, the Ministry said. With projects in 25 countries, Amsterdam-based Bontrup says of its mission: “We innovate with nature to create new opportunities for sustainable infrastructures, offshore developments, logistics and agricultural production.”

, reports the Economy Ministry. The factory would employ 900 workers, and would benefit from the Zelenskiy Administration’s ‘Big Construction’ which includes a major highway safety component. Yu Cheol, the principal investor, reviewed the investment in a meeting in Kyiv on Friday with Stryi Mayor Oleg Kanivets and Deputy Economy Minister Iryna Novikova.

the M-30 which stretches 1,392 km from Stryi, Lviv region to Izvarino, Donetsk. Almost twice as long as the drive from Paris to Marseille, the new M-30 east-west route will unite two existing international roads – the M-12 Stryi-Ternopil-Kropyvnytskyi-Znamenka and M-04 Znamenka-Luhansk-Izvarino. The final 100 km of the M-04 are not in government-controlled territory and will not be renovated.

said Alexander Pertsovsky, Director of the state railroad’s passenger division. Within a year, Ukrainians could buy half of all tickets through smartphones, the railroad operator has predicted.

, reported Interfax-Ukraine. Once completed at the Kharkiv aviation plant, the 52-seat planes would become the backbone of an expanded domestic route network for Motor Sich. Ukreximbank is financing the project.

 The Putin-Biden meeting seems to have passed yesterday with minimal damage to Ukraine’s interests. Now the get-to-know-you phase is behind the two leaders, ideally some progress can be made on respecting red lines. With Best Regards, Jim Brooke

 The National Agency on Corruption Prevention said the Cabinet violated conflict of interest laws by moving Vitrenko on April 28 from his post as acting Energy Minister to CEO of the state energy company. Last night, Clare Spottiswoode, Chair of the Naftogaz Supervisory Board, called on Vitrenko to step down for 10 days until the legal wrangle is resolved.

saying that Ukraine’s Cabinet controls Naftogaz, not the Energy Ministry. In a Naftogaz press release, he said that as acting Energy Minister for four months this year, he did not have the right to vote in Cabinet meetings. Vitrenko cited the case of Yevhen Kravtsov, who as shifted in 2017 from First Deputy Infrastructure Minister to CEO of Ukrzaliznytsia. The Infrastructure Ministry has direct control over the state railroad.

. Prime Minister Shmyhal set a 10-day deadline to resolve the impasse. The challenge to Vitrenko comes as Naftogaz closely watches today’s Biden-Putin meeting in Geneva for news on the Nord Stream 2 pipeline. Last week, Vitrenko was in Washington, meeting with congressional representatives and journalists to campaign against the Russia-Germany bypass gas line, which is 95% complete.

. “Centrenergo is completely ready,” he told reporters, speaking of a company that has 23 power plants across the country. Centrenergo has an installed capacity of 7,690 MW – equivalent to half the capacity of all renewable power producers in Ukraine.

 Zelenskiy said: “My will is that the state should get rid of everything as much as possible. I agree with the position of the Europeans and the United States that the state is not the coolest manager.” Next in line, he said, are two Kyiv hotels – the Presidential and the Ukraine. He said: “Now I really want the President Hotel to be privatized.”

 The starting price is $140 million for the company, Europe’s largest producer of titanium. Writing in Focus, financial journalist Kirill Sazanov compares this privatization to the sale of Krivorozhstal to ArcelorMittal back in 2005. He writes the titanium miner “is also the largest enterprise in its profile in Europe, which makes it of serious interest to foreign investors.”

, Ivan Yuryk, acting CEO of the state railroad, told reporters yesterday at a government development forum. These leases could bring in $4 million a year to the money-losing railroad. At the end of the summer, UZ will start renting out space at the system’s remaining 84 passenger stations. Listing possible tenants who could bid through ProZorro Sale, Yuryk said: “Food courts, pharmacies, shops, recreation areas, shops that sell big brands, brand stores of large chains and manufacturers, bank branches,

. Already six foreign and domestic investors have shown interest in the concessions, scheduled to start in 2023. “What do we see at the exit?” asked Yuryk. “Citizens and guests of our country, arriving at the station, can eat in famous brands of food courts, drink fragrant drinks in cafes, buy souvenirs, visit branded stores of large chains and manufacturers, use the services of banks, please loved ones with fresh flowers from stores, and have fun in the areas for

, the Ministry reports on Facebook. With yields little changed, sales totaled slightly less than half the amount sold last week. For hryvnia bonds, yields ranged from 10.97% for 1-year bonds, to 12.59% for 5-year bonds. The sale of 1-year euro denominated bonds yielded €60.8 million at 2.5%.

, a Reuters poll indicates. The government had forecast a 4% growth spurt in 2021, but the economy shrank 2% in the first quarter. Seven out of 15 analysts polled by Reuters think high inflation will prompt the National Bank of Ukraine to raise the rate to 8% or 8.5%.

international investors increased their investment in Ukrainian government bonds by $377 million this month, prompting the central bank to buy $415 million. Despite the purchases, Ukraine’s currency strengthened yesterday to less than 27 to the dollar for the first time in almost a year.

Tetyana Adamenko, head of the agro weather department of Ukraine’s Hydrometeorological Center, told Interfax-Ukraine yesterday. “The situation is very good, the soil is an excellent source of moisture,” she said, citing a key factor for crops. “There are almost no areas threatened by drought, which is unusual for Ukraine in the last decade.”

according to the Digital Transformation Ministry, citing a study by Chainanalysis. The top three were: US – $4.1 billion; China – $1.1 billion; and Japan – $900 million. Six months ago, the Rada approved on first reading a bill, ‘On Virtual Assets,’ which would provide legislative regulation of a market for crypto-assets. Oleksandr Bornyakov, deputy minister of Digital Transformation, said: “Citizens and crypto companies will be able to officially work and receive income from operations with new assets. The incomes

, Artem Khomenko, Ukraine director for Mere, the Svetofor brand, told reporters. The first store is to open this week in Mykolaiv. To cut costs, the Mere places its products on pallets, rather then shelves. It claims to spend an average of $18,000 to open each store, 1% the amount spent by ATB, Ukraine’s largest supermarket chain. Alexei Danilov, secretary of Ukraine’s National Security and Defense Council, vowed yesterday to block the Russian chain, asking reporters: “The emergence of a

. Last fall, UIA closed its offices in Austria, Belarus, Germany, Italy, Spain, Switzerland, Turkmenistan, and Uzbekistan.

 Europeans have redefined the train station. Last year, I was in Zurich and discovered that the Zürich Hauptbahnhof is a people magnet. The underground shopping center, ShopVille, has over 200 shops. On Sundays, it bustles, while the city is quiet due to Swiss labor laws. The ground level Haupthalle, dating back to 1871, is regularly used for open-air movies, vegetable markets and Christmas fairs. Contrast that to Kyiv Central Passenger station, a dank place where travelers drag their suitcases up steep

announced Yuriy Vitrenko, the new Naftogaz CEO (FT). “We are talking about tens of billions of cubic meters…Central Asian gas alone can fill the whole Ukrainian gas transit system,” Vitrenko said. For the last 15 years, Russia has blocked gas from Kazakhstan, Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan from flowing to the EU. As a result, these nations encouraged China to build a gas pipeline east. Since 2009, the Central Asia–China Gas Pipeline moves gas 7,000 km, from Turkmenistan to Shanghai.

 Vitrenko said he would appeal to EU competition authorities and take Gazprom to international arbitration. In 2018, the Stockholm Arbitration Tribunal ruled in favor of Naftogaz in a dispute with Gazprom, awarding Ukraine’s oil and gas company $4.6 billion. Vitrenko led the Naftogaz legal team that won the dispute.

, the Russia-German gas pipeline that Russia built to bypass Ukraine. Ukraine’s Foreign Minister, Dmytro Kuleba, told Germany’s Welt newspaper that Ukraine “will consider” negotiations on compensation for loss of Gazprom transit fees due to the bypass pipeline.  With compensation talk growing, he said: “The gas pipeline should be used as a lever to encourage Russia to play a constructive role in the peace process in eastern Ukraine.” In Washington, Vitrenko released a video saying that if the Biden Administration

, reports Serhiy Makogon, Director General of Ukraine’s Gas Transmission System Operator.  Although work is to be completed by this time next year, the cross border pipeline links will be inadequate for Ukraine to meet its goal of receiving from Poland 6.6 billion cubic meters – slightly more than half of Ukraine’s total annual imports. Referring to Poland’s Baltic liquefied natural gas landing terminal on the Baltic, Makogon said: “”We are actively working on creating alternative gas supply routes to

, reports Interfax-Ukraine.  Local and international banks including JP Morgan, Dragon Capital and Ukreximbank are arranging the placement. Calls to investors start today for the bonds, which have tenure of 6.25 years. Last month, the Cabinet of Ministers approved state guarantees for Ukravtodor to issue UAH 10 billion in bonds, the equivalent of $370 million.

the largest amount in almost two years. ICU writes of last week’s auction: “It appears that foreigners purchased more than half of last week’s issuance in local currency.” Foreigners now hold over UAH 100 billion in T-bills and appear to be on track to match the February 2020 peak.

To hold the line at 27 hryvnia to the dollar, the National Bank of Ukraine bought $375 million in dollars last week. ICU writes: “This week, we expect foreigners to invest more funds in local-currency debt, causing the hryvnia to appreciate further toward UAH26.5/US$.”

. With 60 lawyers, including 10 partners, Kinstellar is now among the largest law firms in Ukraine. Kinstellar reports: “The merger strengthens our key practice areas, including corporate/M&A, banking & finance, employment & benefits, litigation and real estate, and expands our coverage with new practice areas, including tax and intellectual property.” The new management committee is comprised of: Daniel Bilak, Senior Counsel, and Co-Managing Partners Margarita Karpenko, formerly managing partner of DLA Piper Ukraine, and Olena Kuchynska, managing partner of Kinstellar’s pre-merger Kyiv office.

announced Acting CEO Ivan Yuryk Implementing a long-planned managerial restructuring he said yesterday the goal is “to eliminate duplication of positions and clearly distribute the functionality between departments.” Ukraine’s largest employer, with 250,000 workers, the state railroad moves 82% of the nation’s freight and about half of passengers. For freight tonnage, UZ ranks fourth in Eurasia, after the railways of China, Russia and India.

 UZ acting CEO Ivan Yuryk has announced. Construction of a high-speed network linking Lviv, Kyiv, Dnipro, Odesa and Kharkiv would cost as estimated $15 billion and would be completed by 2030. Italy fastest train, the Frecciarossa, or Red Arrow, runs from Turin in the north to Salerno in the south, often traveling at 300 kph.

 There are now hourly departures between 5:30 am and 9:30 pm. The 40-minute ride includes stops at: Darnytsia, the suburban rail station, and Vydubychi, the transit hub with a Green line Metro stop and a terminal for buses to the south. Due to traffic jams on the Dnipro bridges, the express train increasingly is seen as a reliable way to get from right bank Kyiv to Boryspil, Ukraine’s busiest airport.

 the Ukrainian company writes on Facebook. The repairs at the ADtranz locomotives will be carried about in Ukraine and in Egypt. Serhiy Roi, the plant director, said: “The partnership is planned for a long-term, since the number of locomotives in the future can be increased to 200 units.”

due to Ukraine’s low Covid infection rate. Before the pandemic, Israel was UIA’s top foreign travel destination.

by Ihor Zhovkva, deputy chief of staff of President Zelenskiy, in a Zoom call with Helen Blake, assistant secretary for International and European Affairs at the Irish Prime Minister’s office. Zhovka said: “The opening of the Irish diplomatic mission is a long-awaited event that should help unlock the significant potential for bilateral cooperation between Ukraine and Ireland.”

 One sunny day in the Turkmenistan desert, the Turkmen natural gas line to Russia mysteriously self-exploded. “Wasn’t me, wasn’t me,” Russian officials chorused in their best Bart Simpson imitation. Turkmenistan, a former Russian colony, cherishes its modern motto: ‘Turkmenistan – Motherland of Neutrality.” So, they called in the Chinese. The Chinese spun a vision of a pipeline that would allow Shanghai housewives fry eggs with Turkmen gas. The Russian Ambassador called in the Ashgabat press corps and sneered at the

. SoftServe, a global outsourcing giant with 9,000 employees, outbid six other companies last week, paying $14 million – almost triple the starting auction price.

 “The idea is to create a neighborhood where you can collect talents and have all the conditions for the development of these talents in the city, have futuristic offices, educational institutions.”

“SoftServe is one of the coolest companies in the IT market today in Ukraine…There will be a school, a kindergarten, sports infrastructure, and there will be workplaces.”

 Two prison sales – one in Odesa and one in Irpin, a northern suburb of Kyiv – failed due to a lack of bidders. Justice Minister Denys Mayluska hopes the Lviv sale will generate investor interest. A separate piece of the Lviv prison colony was sold last week for $1.1 million – almost nine times the starting price. Under the program, 30% of sales proceeds go to the state budget and 70% toward rebuilding existing prisons.

, before the financial crisis of 2014-2016. At the June 29 auction on SETAM trading system, properties for sale range from a building facing Kyiv’s historic Sofiyiska Square to a one-room apartment in Uzhgorod. Of the 16, six are in Kyiv, including three “architectural monuments,” says Yevhenia Bozhko, managing partner of the National Electronic Stock Exchange.

 The bears were housed at the Zaporizhia Children’s Railway. They are being transferred to the Ouwehands zoo in Rhenen, Utrecht. The zoo recently reopened its renovated ‘Bear Forest’. “I knew for sure that in the process of selling non-core assets there would be…but I definitely did not expect bears,” Ivan Yuryk, Acting CEO of the state railroad, writes on Facebook. Beyond bears, UZ has identified 182 non-core assets for sale through ProZorro.Sale.

Svitlana Rekrut, Managing Director of the Fund, tells the Kyiv Post. However, assets frozen for a decade have depreciated sharply, presenting obstacles for the Fund to repay its $4.3 billion debt to the state. The Fund’s goal is to triple by 2023 the size of insured deposits, to $21,800. The EU standard is $122,000.

, the Fund reports. Sales included: the 12-story Victoria hotel in Odesa, for $5.1 million; and a central Kyiv office space, for $3.1 million. Reflecting pricing problems and legal clouds over properties, 92% of the 581 auctions did not take place for a lack of bidders.

This was almost 10 times the amount bought by the National Bank of Ukraine in the first week of June. On the supply side, high commodity prices – notably iron and grain – are flooding Ukraine with dollars. On the demand side, Covid controls are preventing many Ukrainians from expensive EU vacations this summer, forcing travelers to settle for cheaper package tours to Egypt and Turkey.

, the Economy Ministry press office reported after Ministry officials met Thursday with China’s ambassador to Ukraine, Fan Xianrong. Trade Representative Taras Kachka said: “The Chinese side is interested in increasing supplies of Ukrainian soybeans, peas, barley, wheat, poultry and other products.” Ukraine’s State Consumer Service has said it is working to increase the export to China of Ukrainian chicken, flour, fish, eggs, apples, blueberries, and cherries.

the Ministry said, would be facilitated by the signing of an intergovernmental agreement on infrastructure construction cooperation. Other priorities for the Ministry are: construction of the 90 km Poltava-Oleksandriya road and increasing China-Ukraine freight traffic. At the G7 Summit in England last weekend, one American official talked of spending “several trillion dollars” on infrastructure projects designed to provide alternatives to China’s Belt and Road.

 that will include counter-artillery radar, electronic warfare equipment and counter-drone technology, Reuters reports. The latest tranche of assistance will come in addition to the $125 million that the Pentagon announced on March 1, which included armed Mark VI patrol boats. President Biden is to meet with President Putin in Geneva on Wednesday.

, Lana Zerkal, Energy Minister advisor, charged in an interview Saturday on Ukraine 24 TV. “Russia is artificially holding back the European market and is not supplying the volumes that Europe needs now, for example, to fill empty gas storage facilities,” Zerkal, a former Naftogaz official, said. “It was a cold spring. Now we need to fill everything, and gas prices are very high.”

, Volodomyr Gnoevoy, head transit for YE Energia, said Thursday at the Ukrainian Gas Open Forum. Designed to carry 400 billion cubic meters, the system now carries 30 bcm for domestic consumption and 40 bcm for transit. If Russia stops sending gas across Ukraine at the end of the 2024 contract, “all this financial burden will fall on the shoulders of domestic consumers,” he said.

to personally negotiate a solution to Russia-Germany Nord Stream 2 gas line, Germany’s Handelsblatt business newspaper reports. To compensate for the loss of Russian gas transit fees, German and American officials have talked about Germany creating a hydrogen production industry in Ukraine.

Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba said on Ukraina 24 TV on Friday. “This will be an official full-fledged visit, which envisages not only the meeting with President Biden, but also many other events,” he said. “We are very carefully preparing this visit.”

Fresh on the heels of the controversy over CEO switch at Naftogaz, London’s Strategy Council holds a webinar tomorrow on Corporate Governance in State-Owned Enterprises in Ukraine. Participants include: Yuliya Kovaliv, Deputy Chair of the Supervisory Board, Naftogaz Group; Artem Shevalev, Deputy Chair of the Supervisory Boards of PrivatBank and Ukrgasbank;  Andriy Boytsun, independent corporate governance consultant; Olga Bielkova, Director, Government & International Affairs, Ukrainian Gas TSO; Sevki Acuner, Chair of the Supervisory Board, UZ & Ukrenergo; Roman Bondar, First Deputy CEO, Ukroboronprom; and Artur Somov, Acting Chairman of the Management Board, UMCC

From now on, Ukraine’s state-owned oil and gas company will not “crowd out” foreign energy companies, he promised during a US-Ukraine Business Council webinar yesterday. Speaking from Washington, Vitrenko, a Naftogaz veteran, said he was behind many of the post-Maidan, free market reforms adopted at the company. Edward Chow, a former US energy company executive and a panelist, welcomed the 44-year-old Vitrenko, saying: “You have been preparing all your life for this job.”

, he told Radio Free Europe. Describing himself as “a true reformer,” Vitrenko said he will focus on boosting Naftogaz’s production with the help of Western partners. Vitrenko also said he would go after Dmytro Firtash, the energy tycoon wanted by the United States on corruption charges.

, Nord Stream 2 AG reports. Testing with gas is part of commissioning process. The 1,230 km pipeline should be completed by early August, President Putin said last week. Commissioning is expected to be completed this fall.

under a contract signed yesterday between the US company and Energoatom, Ukraine’s state company responsible for nuclear power generation. To reduce dependency on Russian nuclear fuel, Energoatom switches a seventh reactor later this year to fuel supplied by Westinghouse Electric Sweden. In 2024, a second reactor at the Rivne nuclear plant is to make the switch, Westinghouse reports.

 Herman Galushchenko, Ukraine’s new Energy Minister, said: “Ukraine is interested in deepening cooperation with Westinghouse, as diversification of nuclear fuel supply is a guarantee of energy security.”

 speaker after speaker warned yesterday at the European-Ukrainian Energy Day forum in Kyiv. “Electricity trading cross the border may no longer bring in funds for needed investments,” warned Mats Lundin, chairman of the EU Energy Agency. “Steel exports may no longer be a viable business for the large Ukrainian industries that we have learnt to rely on for job opportunities and tax revenues.”

” noted Matti Massikas, head of the EU Delegation to Ukraine. “Ukrainian industry pays currently 15 [euro] cents for emitting one ton of CO2. In the EU, the price has reached €50.”

 said Ukraine’s Energy Minister Herman Halushchenko. But Baher El-Hifnawi of the World Bank and Mark Magaletsky of the EBRD cautioned that their institutions would only contribute to a bailout package if it were part of a comprehensive package of changes to prevent a recurrence.

” Nefco, the Helsinki-based Nordic Environment Finance Corp. said in a statement released Wednesday at a solar and wind producers forum in Kyiv. “Fossil energy should be subject to a CO2 tax.” After funding 421 MW of wind and solar projects in Ukraine, Nefco said it has frozen future funding because “the green tariff agreements [are] not being fulfilled.”

,” Carl Sturen, company CEO, told Interfax-Ukraine after Wednesday’s press conference. If adopted, the excise tax would cost Vindkraft €3 million a year, he estimated. With the changing rules and mounting debts, he said he is “constantly” renegotiating loans with banks.

. In the first, $800 million phase, Danieli and Metinvest are to build a plant capable of producing 1.2 million tons of steel a year – cold-rolled, galvanized and color-coated. The Italian equipment “will allow Metinvest to achieve world-class product quality at all stages of production – from semi-finished products to coated rolled products,” Yuriy Ryzhenkov, director general of Metinvest, said at the signing ceremony.

Metinvest says: “The second stage of the project includes the construction of a new annealing furnace department, a skin pass mill and a roll slitting unit, as well as a new line for polymer coating on galvanized rolls.” The highly automated plant will create only 230 jobs.