Page 34 - BELRptNov18

9.2 Major corporate news 9.2.2 Automotive corporate news
Belarusian state-owned heavy truck manufacturer BelAZ shipped 34% of all the mining vehicles and road construction vehicles it sold to coal industry companies in January-September, the company said on November 3. Outsourcing companies accounted for 16% of the BelAZ vehicles shipped in January-September, while The other buyers included diamond and gold mining companies (15% of all the sales), metallurgy and iron ore industry companies (14%), non-ferrous metallurgy companies (13%), non-metallic industry and civil engineering industry companies (5%), and chemical industry companies (3%), according to propagandist news agency BELTA . BelAZ, which is subordinated to the Belarusian Industry Ministry, doesn't usually publish official production and financial results. According to earlier unverified media reports, BelAZ produced 407 dump trucks as of late September. In 2017, the company saw produced 615 dump trucks and sold 646. The company forecasts a 30% year-on-year increase (to 800 units) in truck output in January-December.
9.2.5 Retail corporate news
Eurotorg , the largest food retailer in Belarus, increased its net retail sales by 19.2% year-on-year to BYN1,050mn (net retail sales in US dollar terms increased by 13.3% y/y to $513mn) in July-September, the company reported on October 18. In January-September, the company's net retail sales increased by 14.0% y/y to BYN2,986mn (net retail sales in US dollar terms increased by 8.6% y/y to $1,487mn). In July-September, net retail sales from Eurotorg’s offline grocery business increased by 13.3% y/y to BYN998mn (in US dollar terms increased by 7.7% y/y to $488mn). In January-September, net retail sales from Eurotorg’s offline grocery business increased by 12.0% y/y to BYN2,935mn (in US dollar terms increased by 6.7% y/y to $1,462nm). As of late September, the company operated 677 grocery stores with total selling space of 306,000sqm. In the third quarter of 2018, Eurotorg added 50 net new grocery stores with 5,700,000sqm of selling space. Since the beginning of 2018, the company has added 177 net new grocery stores with 27,500,000sqm of selling space. Like-for-like (LFL) sales grew by 3.3% in July-September, driven by solid growth in the LFL average ticket of 6.6%, significantly above the food inflation (3.9%), and partially offset by negative LFL traffic of -3.0%. Some redistribution of LFL traffic in favour of an increase in the LFL average ticket in the third quarter 2018 was due to the activation of marketing campaigns aimed at encouraging consumers to spend more per visit. In July-September, marketing activities ran for a total of 63 days compared to only six days in the third quarter of 2017, the company said in the statement. On October 11, Eurotorg confirmed its intention to float on the London Stock Exchange (LSE) . The offering is expected to raise approximately $200mn in primary proceeds to the company. The company intends to use the net proceeds to partially repay the foreign-currency debt, in line with its strategic objective of reducing its foreign-currency debt exposure. The total offering size is expected to be more than $300mn. Following the announcement of the IPO, S&P Global Ratings placed Eurotorg’s ‘B-‘ long-term credit ratings on CreditWatch with positive implications, indicating that the agency could raise the ratings by one notch in the event of a successful IPO and planned debt reduction. The agency cited "a more stable
34 BELARUS Country Report November 2018 www.intellinews.com