Financial news

In the last quarter of the year Bulgaria will report economic growth of 1.6%. That will make our country seventh in growth in Europe, experts’ forecasts in a Bloomberg’s survey point out. Czech Republic is ranked first with expected increase of 3%. It is followed by Slovakia with almost the same result. Spain, Hungary, Germany and Portugal are the countries that are expected to report greater economic increase for the last three months of 2015, as compared to Bulgaria. The largest economy in Europe - Germany is expected to rise by 1.8 percent in the period from October to December as the once poorest country in the EU - Portugal. After Bulgaria in the survey with expected growth of 1% are France, Austria and Italy. Surprisingly, for Greece that faces exit of the euro zone, analysts predict economic growth of 0.9%. Croatia and Switzerland are last in the ranking with extrapolated growth of 0.2 and 0.1 percent respectively.

Salaries of civil servants in Bulgaria in 2016 will be raised only if the ministers optimize their staff. The nominal cost of staff in ministries should be maintained at the level of 2015, according to the newly published instructions of the Ministry of Finance. According to the guidelines, the departments must comply and with the expenditure ceiling, set in April by a decree of the Council of Ministers. In the case of the Ministry of Agriculture, for example, this ceiling is set at BGN 247 million and BGN 227 million for the Ministry of Agriculture for 2015 and 2016. The expenditure of the ministries of education and defense for next year will have to remain respectively BGN 417 million and BGN 954 million - just like in 2015. The new instructions of the Ministry of Finance in preparation of the budget for 2016 aim to preserve financial discipline. For example, ministries are allowed to have new expenditure commitments next year only if they maintain or reduce their obligations to suppliers. As such, the overall costs for the administration in 2016 (excluding salaries and social security contributions) are projected to shrink by almost BGN 50 million to BGN 4.69 billion.

	Mineral Fuels, Tailoring Products, Canning, Perfumery and Cosmetics, Furniture, Meat Products, Wine, Wood-processing Industry

Companies

The first stage, namely construction of Club hotel RIU Helios paradise, which takes up one third of the total territory of the unanimous complex, is over. The hotel has a built up area of more than 70 thousand square meters. The next stages envisage construction of one more hotel towards Sunny beach with about 250 facilities and related infrastructure, as well as building a holiday village with about 350 premises to the north. Capability for extension of the already built children’s aqua park with facilities for grownups is also being considered. Plans are zone for trade to be detached, as well. More playgrounds and tennis courses will be added to the existing multipurpose sports playground. There will be an outdoor amphitheater with 2,000 seats and a disco. Invested funds currently exceed BGN 100 million. The completion of the entire project will take up approximately the same amount. The project provides rich greenery and landscaping around the hotel.

Bulgaria’s Competition Protection Commission (CPC) has imposed four fines totalling BGN 200,000 on two companies offering Uber taxi and car-sharing services, commission spokesperson Mario Gavrilov said on July 6 2015. Gavrilov said that the CPC held that the Uber service was identical to that of taxi services, but suppliers circumvented tax laws, did not pay licence fees, did not account for their revenue and so created an uncompetitive environment in the market. “We imposed two fines on the two companies carrying out the Uber service in Bulgaria…on the one hand, we imposed a fine of BGN 50,000 for violating provisions of the Competition Protection Act. They said that they were not performing such but after a thorough analysis, we found that they were doing just that, first providing transport for a fee and beyond that providing a journey on a route defined by the user,” Gavrilov said. “And besides that, as we are empowered by law, there were two BGN 50,000 fines because they refused to co-operate with us and we could not get the information that we requested from the companies,” he said.

Chinese investor Fung Gouming and manager of the Bulgarian-Chinese joint venture Bulgaria tianshinong feed Co. Nadya Marinova have confirmed before the Governor of Dobrich their intention to construct a forage plant in the town. Re-registration of the company has already been done. The company expressed intention to invest EUR 21 million in the future production facility. It will be built at two stages, as on the first one EUR 11 million will be invested. In that way day production capacity of 500 tons of combined forage will be accomplished. Slightly more than EUR 10 million will be invested at the second stage of the project. Production capacity will be doubled, thus. When the plant is over its annual capacity will go over 300 tons of forage. Construction of warehouses with capacity of 50 000 tones is envisaged, too. Over 80 workers will be employed in the enterprise. Feed, made in Dobrich will be exported to China. The company has already acquired at a public auction land in the Industrial Zone west.

Several days ago the Municipal Bank gоt a good credit rating by the international rating agency Moody's Investors Service. It put assessment B1 / Not-Prime deposit ratings in local and foreign currency credit rating from baseline (BCA) of b2. Long-term deposit rating B1 have stable outlook. Moody's also awarded Ba2 (cr)/Not-Prime (cr) assessment of counterparty risk (rating RC), which is very close to the rating of the Bulgarian state. Municipal Bank benefits from its chosen niche in the financing of municipalities and servicing the budget, which is assessed as stable and relatively low risk business by Moody's. The assessment of the international agency is a very good sign and testimonial not only for the bank but also confirms the resilience of the banking system in the country.

Europe

Standard & Poor's on Monday said that in light of the Greece "no" vote this weekend it is now more likely than not that Greece will leave the euro. The ratings agency said the euro zone countries' exposure to a so-called Grexit is 3 percent to 4 percent of gross domestic product on average. It said, however, that costs will be spread over time and so there would be no direct ratings impact. S&P said that expectations so far are that there will be no direct ratings impact from the Greek economic crisis on South East European countries. In an interview with Reuters, S&P's Moritz Kraemer said the result of the vote limited both Greece's and the euro zone's room for maneuver in what are already difficult debt negotiations. "We think it's more likely than not now that 'Grexit' would happen because its just so difficult for (Greek prime minister)Tsipras to row back after such a victory to what was on the table before," Kraemer said.However, he did not expect any rating impact for other high-debt euro zone countries.

America

Houston-based oilfield services’ company Baker Hughes Inc. reported a rise in the U.S. rig count (number of rigs searching for oil and gas in the country). This is the second consecutive rise after witnessing a falling trend for twenty eight weeks at a stretch. This upside can be traced back to an increase in the tally of oil-directed rigs, which rose for the first time this year after 29 consecutive weeks of decline. Taking cue from here, crude prices recovered substantially after sinking to a 6-year low of under $44-a-barrel in March. The West Texas Intermediate (WTI) oil futures are currently trading at around $56 per barrel. Weekly Summary: Rigs engaged in exploration and production in the U.S. totaled 862 for the week ended Jul 2, 2015. This was up by three from the previous week’s rig count. Following the latest rise, the current nationwide rig count is still less than half the prior-year level of 1,873. It rose to a 22-year high in 2008, peaking at 2,031 in the weeks ended Aug 29 and Sep 12.

Asia

The Shanghai Consumer Council, a consumer protection group in China, has filed a lawsuit against mobile companies Samsung and Oppo. The group believes that the two companies have installed many unnecessary apps in their gadgets. The group said it filed the lawsuit after hearing complaints from users. The group has not given parameters as to what kinds of apps are unnecessary in their standards. But since the number of preloaded apps in Samsung and Oppo phones are said to affect the convenience of users, the consumer watchdog decided to bring the issue to court. The group performed a study on over 20 smartphone models. It tested and saw Samsung Galaxy Note 3 has 44 preloaded apps. Oppo's Find 7A, on the other hand, has 71. The apps consume large amounts of mobile data, making the device slower. Uninstalling them also takes time and is sometimes problematic, some complaints say. The SCC has reached out to the two companies regarding the issue. The group suggested that the smartphone companies should be more informative with their packaging.

Emine cape

Emine is the most tempestuous cape at the Black Sea coast. The Emine cape ends with a 60-metre-long sheer rock, surrounded by hundreds of reefs and rocks jutting out above the water, scattered out at the sea at more than 250 m. That is why the coast here is extremely dangerous and sailors round it from far away. A lighthouse and remains of a mediaeval monastery are preserved here. A beautiful legend about the Emine cape is still narrated. Once, the light-housekeeper was an old sailor, who lived here with his only and incredibly beautiful daughter. She lived at large – she swam, rowed a boat and fished. The rough sea made her strong and brave. Once, in a terrible storm, she rescued a drowning castaway sailor. The swain fell in love with the lass. At parting he promised to turn back but never kept his pledge. From morning till night, standing at the cape, the girl waited for her beloved. Finally, mad with anguish, she jumped into the sea abyss and the waters became crimson. Even today, when the sun is rising, the sea around the cape crimsons and reminds of the lass’ hope that never came true.

On that day:  St. Nedelya (St. Kyriaki) The Devil’s bridge