Page 28 - BELRptAug18

9.2 Major corporate news 9.2.2 Automotive corporate news
Belarusian state-owned airline Belavia is going to purchase four new Boeing 737 MAX 8 aircraft on a lease basis , the company's media office said in a statement on July 17. "Belavia continues to consistently implement the strategy for modernising the fleet thanks to cooperation with reliable partners such as ALC," BelaPAN news agency quoted Belavia's director general Anatoliy Gusarov as saying. "The acquisition of the four next-generation aircraft on a lease basis will contribute to the further development of the airline and, consequently, to the improvement of the quality of passenger service." He added that delivery of the Boeing 737 MAX 8s will allow Belavia's passengers "to start traveling only with positive impressions and will make flights as comfortable as possible". This will be the second delivery of new aircraft directly from Boeing’s plant. In 2016, Belavia acquired three Boeing Next-Generation 737-800s. As of June, Belavia operated a fleet of 29 aircraft, including five Boeing 737-800s, six Boeing 737-500s, seven Boeing 737-300s, three Embraer-175s, four Embraer-195s, and four CRJ 100-200s.
9.2.12 Transport corporate news
Russia’s Russian Railways (RZD) is planning a RUB80bn ($1.3bn) bond with a 100 years maturity to finance part of the company’s RUB7.1 trillion investment programme, Vedomosti reported. The bonds will be issued in either rubles of foreign currency and used to finance both the current investment projects as well as development projects. From the total of RUB7.1 trillion the company is planning to borrow RUB2.5 trillion from the markets with the rest coming from retained earnings. The debt of RZD at the end of 2017 was RUB1.076 trillionwith a net debt to EBITDA ratio of 2.8, the company said in a recent presentation. Since the beginning of the year, the debt burden has increased by 17%. At the end of 2018, RZD planned to increase its debt to RUB1.22 trillion with the debt to EBITDA ratio increasing to 3.1. The investment plans for 2018 run to RUB549.6bn of which RUB211bn are projects commission by the government.
28 BELARUS Country Report August 2018 www.intellinews.com