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Eastern Europe
May 18, 2018 www.intellinews.com I Page 18
processing plants and a furniture factory.
Today, IKEA appears to be approaching Ukraine with more caution. Specifically, the Swedish retail giant is trying to secure the support of the government in Kyiv with the aim of smoothening its entrance onto the market.
In late April, the UkraineInvest investment promotion office announced that a special working group would be created, including Kyiv city administration representatives, "for the complex and effective resolution of issues related to certifying products, licensing, customs duties and
Medvedev confirms plans to create offshore companies in Russia
bne IntelliNews
Russian Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev has confirmed plans to create special “onshore offshore” zones in Russia to allow sanctioned oligarchs to easily transfer ownership of their assets out of the reach of US and European courts.
The idea was floated after several top Russian businessmen, most notably
oligarch Oleg Deripaska, were named in the Specially Designated Nationals And Blocked Persons List (SDN List) released by the US Treasury Department (USTD) on April 6 in the latest round of sanctions.
“Very soon we are planning to create special regions with a special legal status and a
other matters in order to guarantee that IKEA can open its stores in Ukraine as soon as possible".
Meanwhile, Zenon Zawada at Kyiv-based brokerage Concorde Capital believes that the IKEA saga has become "a barometer for Ukraine’s investment climate."
"It has almost become a tongue-in-cheek part of local lore that Ukraine will have joined the modern world once it has an IKEA store," he added. "Numerous times, the public was informed that IKEA’s arrival was imminent, only for the plans to suddenly unravel."
Russian Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev says Russia will set up onshore offshore tax free zones.
special tax regime in Primorsky Krai and the Kaliningrad region on the Russky and Oktyabrsky islands,” Medvedev said at a legal forum in St. Petersburg, naming territories located in Russia’s Far East as well as the Russian enclave on the Baltic Sea.
The special administrative zones are to help Russian businesspeople transfer assets onshore whilst allowing them to avoid the bureaucratic jungle of permissions and regulations involved in setting up a Russian domiciled legal entity. Moreover, the onshore-offshore nature of the zones means companies registered there are essentially in a foreign country as far as the Russian tax code is concerned and so not liable for Russian taxes — an important incentive.