Page 118 - RusRPTNov18

is another emerging trend in Russian retail universe. Apart from Mail.ru, US venture fund FJ Labs, Russian venture fund Larix, and a number of private investors collected a total of $1mn for Foodza, according to Holyaznikov. The main goal of the service will be cutting inefficient middlemen between farms and consumers, increasing the transparency in the sector, improving the logistics and distribution of fresh farm produce.
Qiwi CEO Sergey Solonin bought 350,000 class B shares of the company on the open market in late August and early September , the company has disclosed. The purchase prices were in the range of $14.05-14.21, which was 20-21% above the share price as of yesterday’s close ($11.71). We see these purchases from an insider as a positive sign, which indirectly supports our view on a potential re-rating of Qiwi. Our unchanged 12-month Target Price of $25 implies an ETR of 117%: Buy reiterated. Prior to the latest acquisition, Solonin owned only class A shares, which carry ten votes per share, while the acquired shares carry one vote per share. Based on our estimates, Solonin's voting interest in Qiwi has increased from 62.1% to 62.2%, while his economic interest rose from 19.3% to 19.9%. We note that in the middle of August, Solonin announced his departure on a nine-month world trip, so he likely acquired the shares when travelling.
Russian microchip company Angstrem-T in Moscow Region's city of Zelenograd might come under control of state development bank Vnesheconombank (VEB) as it is unable to service $945mn loan taken out back in 2008, Reuters reported on October 17 citing company's chairman Leonid Reiman. Reiman, Russia’s former minister of communications and information technologies, said the company’s inability to reimburse its debt was in part tied to US restrictions on the import of dual-use technologies and its addition to US Treasury sanctions in 2016, according to Reuters. "Although we initially received the (US) State Department’s consent for this project and the delivery of the technology here, the sanctions caused the deadlines for its completion to be drawn out," Reiman told Reuters. Prior to the sanctions that bar it from doing business with US companies, Angstrem-T purchased most of its equipment from US Advanced Micro Devices, as well as and bought a license from IBM to produce chips. In 2016 the company was a poster child of government's import substitution drive in the nascent Russian high tech sector. Now the sanctions and repeated delays have "caused Angstrem-T’s products to become outdated," unnamed source in the field of microelectronics in Russia told Reuters, adding that the market for the 90 and 130-nanometer microchips it produces has significantly shrunk in recent years. Reportedly once the VEB takeover is complete, Angstrem-T will attempt to shift its production to the more modern 28-nanometer chips, used in the products of global majors like Apple, Samsung and Sony.
9.2.10 Utilities corporate news
InterRAO has released its 9mo18 operating data. The total group's electricity production printed at 96,041mn kWh, implying a 1% YoY slide vs. the 0.2% YoY improvement in generation at Russian capacities. This was driven by the capacity commissioning/decommissioning schedule, along with the company’s repair plans. Total heat sendout increased 4.7% YoY to 267,977k GCal, on the back of the weather in the regions of its operations. Electricity retail sales increased 4.2% YoY owing to the new subsidiaries operating in the segment, while trading activities faced a 6% YoY reduction of
118 RUSSIA Country Report November 2018 www.intellinews.com