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Eastern Europe
May 4, 2018 www.intellinews.com I Page 22
own people and the international donors on which Ukraine relies.
“Poroshenko is in trouble and he needs a new political strategy to pull himself out of this ratings collapse. Unfortunately, his recent campaign
to get canonical recognition of the Ukrainian Orthodox church (which began on April 17, during the time this poll was conducted) won’t do the trick, as voter concerns are far more pragmatic. Workers want better wages, while entrepreneurs want functioning courts and more favourable tax conditions. Tymoshenko has understood this,
Russian metal tycoon Deripaska caves in to US pressure
bne IntelliNews
Russian metal tycoon and Kremlin insider Oleg Deripaska has caved in to US pressure and agreed to sell some his shares in Rusal to take his stake to under 50% in the hopes that the US Treasury Department (USTD) will remove some of the destructive sanctions placed on his company on April 6, the company said on April 27.
Deripaska was the hardest hit by the new sanctions list, presumably for his role in interfering with the US presidential elections.
The USTD released an update to the sanctions against Russia on April 6, with seven Russian tycoons, 12 major companies and 17 govern- ment officials added to the Specially Designated Nationals And Blocked Persons List (SDN List). Deripaska’s companies made up more than half of the companies on the list.
which is why she has pulled out in front of the pack,” Zenon Zawada of Concorde Capital said in a note.
“We can’t help but notice that Poroshenko’s ratings collapse began weeks after the forced deportation of [former Georgian president and Odessa governor] Mikheil Saakashvili, which was conducted outside the courts and therefore widely criticised. Public trust in Poroshenko had already been low, but this tactic of suppressing dissent – which put an end to the downtown protests – might have come at a price too high,” Zawada added.
Deripaska agrees to give up control of Rusal
Rusal warned that the new sanctions slapped on it, "may result in technical defaults in relation to certain credit obligations" the company said in a filing to the Hong Kong stock exchange where its shares are listed on April 9.
Things got worse for the company after London Metals Exchange (LME) said on April 10 it
was halting all trading in commodities produced by Rusal. This could account for 10-20% of Rusal's sales, analysts surveyed by Vedomosti daily estimated.
That was quickly followed by Swiss oil trader Glencore saying it was putting on hold the decision to convert a 8.75% stake in Rusal to GDRs of En+, which was previously welcomed by investors as part of En+'s successful $1.5bn IPO in November 2017.