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Eastern Europe
July 12, 2019 www.intellinews.com I Page 20
Construction of the Turkish Stream pipeline 90% finished
Last week Russian state-owned gas giant Gazprom invited bank analysts on a trip to inspect the con- struction work on the Turkish Stream (aka Turk- Stream) pipeline. They report work on the pipeline is on schedule and that it is 90% complete and should go online before the end of the year.
Turkish Stream is part of a trident of pipelines running from Russia to Europe to supply gas to Gazprom’s main customers. Turkish Stream expands the southern route and is an addition to the Druzhba pipeline that runs through Ukraine and has been the main conduit since Soviet times. More controversial is the construction of the 55bn cubic metre (bcm) Nord Stream 2 pipeline that runs under the Baltics and has been the subject of bitter political wrangling.
Opponents of Nord Stream 2 claim that it will make Europe more dependent on Russian gas,
but while the same argument could be made against Turkish Stream, little has been said about the latter as most of the pipeline runs through Turkey, which is not an European Union (EU) member and so the EU has no leverage over Ankara’s decision to go ahead with the pipeline.
Analysts visited the Russkaya compressor sta- tion in Russia last week, the starting point of the Turkish Stream pipeline, and the receiving Turkish Stream terminal in Turkey.
Gazprom also held a roundtable discussion
at which the company and independent experts (IHS Markit, S&P Global Platts and EPPEN Consulting) provided their views and outlooks on the European gas market.
Read the full story here
Sberbank the most valuable brand in Russia, MTS most valuable in telecom
Russia’s largest bank state-controlled Sberbank is the most valuable brand in Russia in 2019, val- ued at RUB842bn ($13.3bn) by Brand Finance, as reported by Vedomosti daily in 2019. Over the year Sberbank's brand increased in value by over 25%.
As reported by bne IntelliNews, Sberbank is on
the forefront of digital innovation in Russia and prepares to capitalise on the popularity of its brand by uniting various services under Sber ecosystem.
Russia's natural gas giant Gazprom that recently
showed another surge in capitalisation had its brand value soar by 70% to RUB552bn, followed by Lukoil with RUB397bn, up by 40%. MobileTelesystems, or MTS, was Russia's top telecom brand valued at RUB121bn.
Other companies in the top 10 include Rosneft oil major (RUB247bn), Russian Railways (RUB186bn), Magnit retailer (RUB170bn), VTB Bank (RUB145bn), Tatneft regional oil company (RUB132.5bn), Novatek gas major and LNG runner-up (RUB120bn).