Page 56 - bne IntelliNews Country Report: Ukraine Dec17

Energy (DTEKUA). Recall, we estimated that the regulator will allow thermal power plants to enjoy about an 18% y/y electricity price hike next year. The next meeting is scheduled for November 24. Alexander Paraschiy: It will be negative for DTEK if the regulator won’t be able to approve the forecasted wholesale price (increasing the rates of thermal power plants) for 2018 by December 21. The regulator is short of time, and now there is material risk that it won’t be able to gather for any decision by the end of this year. In particular, the quorum for NERC meetings is four commissioners (out of seven seats total), while as of today there are four valid commissioners of, which one has not been signing up for the regulator’s meetings since last week. Meanwhile, the tenure of two commissioners expires at the end of this week. In this way, starting next week, the NERC will have only two commissioners and no power to adopt any regulation. To make matters worse, the procedure of appointing new commissioners takes at least 75 days by law, meaning that (all things being equal) the regulator won’t be able to approve any new regulations until mid-February 2018. Any earlier moves, therefore, will require unorthodox solutions, including amended legislation or severe procedural breaches.
56 UKRAINE Country Report December 2017 www.intellinews.com