BGN 3.703 billion are the funds accumulated in the Silver Fund at the end of January, according to the data of the Ministry of Finance. Of the collected funds, BGN 3.691 billion are in an account at the BNB, which practically means that they are not generating income at the moment. And for the entire time of its existence, the fund, which is supposed to guarantee the sustainability of the pension system, has managed to earn only BGN 4.48 million from interest. The reason is that the money management strategy adopted in 2021 foresees a conservative model for their investment until the end of 2024. It started in 2007 with nearly BGN 2 billion, since then another 1.7 billion has been accumulated. Last year, new receipts were BGN 144.56 million - twice less than the amount received in 2021. For the first this month, BGN 7.72 million entered the fund. Through legislative changes, the money in the Silver Fund can change its purpose and finance urgent expenses. Currently, the only real function of the funds accumulated there is to support the fiscal reserve.

Blue cards for professionals from countries outside the European Union issued in Bulgaria in 2022 are more than three times more than the previous year. For the past year, they were 1393, while in 2021 they were 439. From the beginning of 2022 until October 12, a total of 741 blue cards were issued. Despite the majority of permits issued to foreigners, they are still far from the needs of businesses that complain about the cumbersome procedure. With changes to the Labor Migration and Labor Mobility Act, the work permit regime for highly qualified foreigners from countries outside the European Union was eased in Bulgaria. It is expected that they will contribute to increasing interest in the permit this year. According to data from the "Migration" agency, 50 permits were issued to Ukrainians in 2022. The blue card is one of the options for a foreigner from a third country to start working in Bulgaria, the other most common, but for people with lower qualifications, is a seasonal worker permit from 90 days to 9 months.

The Silverline Capital fund has invested 4 million euros in the facial recognition technology the Rock, created by the company Alcatraz AI. The new technology is a combination of hardware and software that allows contactless access to buildings and premises through 3D biometric facial recognition, without having to perform any physical actions - approaching a camera, using a magnetic card, chip, fingerprint or iris print. The Rock biometric devices save the cost of physical security and are many times more reliable than access with magnetic cards and fingerprints. In Bulgaria, Alcatraz AI programmers who mainly deal with Computer vision and develop neural networks for automated use of technology.

The chains for perfumes and cosmetics "Douglas Bulgaria" and BeautyZone, which operate through the company "Perfumes Douglas Bulgaria" in 18 sites in the country, will become 100% owned by the German Douglas. Her Dutch company, Kirk Beauty Netherlands BV, which currently owns 76% of the shares in Perfumery Douglas Bulgaria, plans to buy the remaining 24% in the company from Nina Georgieva, founder of BeautyZone and former local representative of Douglas. Douglas entered Bulgaria in 2008, when it bought 51% (and subsequently another 25%) of the company "Cosmetics Plus Retail", later renamed "Perfumes Douglas Bulgaria". Until then, the Bulgarian BeautyZone cosmetics chain operated through "Cosmetics Plus Retail", which has had sales outlets since 2005. In 2009, the first Douglas outlet was opened, and since then the two brands - Douglas and BeautyZone - have been operating through the joint company. "Cosmetic plus" is the sole property of Georgieva and imports the products of a large number of brands for perfumes, cosmetics and make-up, including Clarins, Guerlain, Lanvin, Hermes, Boucheron and Carita. Founded as a soap factory in Hamburg in 1821, Douglas is today a leader in the sale of cosmetics and perfumes in Europe. In the 1970s, the company opened stores and acquired local leaders in the cosmetics and make-up sector in the Netherlands, France and Italy, Switzerland, Spain and Portugal. Later, Douglas also entered Central and Eastern Europe, starting with Poland, Hungary, Slovenia, the Czech Republic, Romania, and in 2008, it also started operations in Bulgaria with the help of the already established BeautyZone chain. Other leading traders in the sector are the brands Sephora and Prettyshop, which operate respectively through the companies "Sephora Bulgaria" and "Notos Bulgaria" and for 2021 their turnover is BGN 10 and 10.5 million, respectively.

Prolonged negotiations with the businessman Dragan Sholak, who is behind "United Group", for the sale of PFC "Levski" JSC, failed because of the accumulated liabilities in the amount of BGN 30 million. The club could sell some players, but the United Group called for no sale. The Suga Club urgently needs to look for other options for its survival. Serbian businessman Dragan Sholak owns "Vivacom" and "Nova TV" in Bulgaria through his company "United Group".

Instead of using the technology of the so-called virtual POS terminal for collecting fees for paid parking in the blue zone of Varna, the local administration pays commissions in the amount of nearly BGN 1 million per year, as it outsources services to an intermediary. The municipal enterprise "Parking and blue zone" in Varna uses the intermediary services of the company "Tixi" AD for the payments made in the blue zone in the city under a contract signed in October 2021 after a public procurement procedure. The term of the contract is 36 months, and the value is slightly over BGN 2.8 million including VAT. This makes BGN 77,000 per month. According to the contract, the commission of "Tixi" AD for each of the parking fees paid through the mobile application "Varna Parking" is 12.5%. However, it reaches 16.5% in the case of payments, which are largely carried out by SMS. When loading a virtual wallet in the "Varna Parking" application, the tariff of "EasyPay" JSC for payment to Internet merchants is applicable, and when making payments on the Internet with bank cards, additional fees may be charged by the card issuing bank. Checks with the statistics on the movements on the bank accounts of customers of the blue zone in Varna show that "Epay" is part of the payment scheme and, in addition to the difference of 0.08 cents with the amount loaded into the virtual wallet, a BGN 1 fee is also reflected there for service from Ipay. At the opening of the blue zone in 2017, the first contract for mediation of online and sms payments in the zone was concluded with the company "Empiriu", with subcontractors "EasyPay" and "Epay". The contract is worth BGN 1.5 million excluding VAT and again with a three-year term. For 2020, the revenue from paid parking in the central part of the city is over BGN 6 million, which means that the commission paid to "Empiriu" was just over BGN 1 million per year. The company "Tixi" was established in 2016, consolidating into it "Consulting Agency for Information Technologies" (KAIT) and "Tix.bg", which have experience with electronic billing and traffic management. The representative of "Tixi" and shareholder is Nikolay Nedyalkov, former executive director of "Information Service". At the end of December it became known that "Tixi" was the only participant in the procedure for awarding the public contract for changing the ticket system and parking in Plovdiv as well. It is worth BGN 12 million.

The shareholders of "Prime Property BG" approved the acquisition of land in Burgas for 967 thousand euros. The property, which is located in the area of Kurt Tepe, has an area of almost 15 thousand square meters and is designated for industrial construction. The seller is the company "Nevada Tours 2004" JSC, which is also owned by Sava Choroleev, who is on the board of directors of "Prime Property BG" through his company "SVS" JSC. The price of the property is 967,070 euros without VAT. As of the end of 2022, the total balance sheet value of the company's investment portfolio is BGN 21,443 million. Besides the Sea Lighthouse complex in St. The Vlas company owns part of the shopping facilities in the "Karina" complex in Sunny Beach, a plot of land in the village of Lozenets near Tsarevo, four plots of land in Sofia - on Pirotska St., on "Bulgaria" Blvd. in "Manastirski Livadi" and two areas "Triaditsa", South Park III part, terrain in Smolyan, terrain in Burgas. The last two properties were acquired in 2021 and 2022, respectively.

The number of mergers and acquisitions (M&A) deals in Central and Eastern Europe (CEE) increased in 2022, but their total value decreased. The results achieved are comparable to those of the pre-pandemic 2019, according to the data from the joint annual survey of the international legal organization CMS and the analyst company EMIS - The Emerging Europe M&A Report 2022-2023. According to their observations, the total number of M&A deals concluded for the period in the region was 1,229, compared to 1,164 for 2021. However, their size was more modest - in 2022, only three megadeals worth more than 1 billion were announced in CEE. euros, while a year earlier there were 15 of the mergers and acquisitions in the region. Thus, the total volume of transactions for the past 12 months was 32.93 billion euros, or 20% less compared to the record 41.31 billion euros reported in 2021. The dynamics in Bulgaria are similar - a higher number of transactions, but at a low overall value. According to the survey, 72 contracts were signed in the country last year compared to 70 a year earlier. In total, their value was 1.43 billion euros, compared to 1.91 billion euros in 2021. Volumes remain significantly lower than the pre-crisis levels of 2018 and 2019, when deals of more than 2 billion euros were concluded annually . The report includes transactions announced in the period January 1 - December 1, 2022, which are worth at least 1 million euros for the acquisition of a share of at least 2% of the shares of a given company or of individual assets, such as business transactions properties, the threshold is EUR 5 million. Business digitization continues to be among the main drivers of M&A activity as well. An expression of this is the fact that, for the third year in a row, the largest number of transactions were concluded in the "Telecoms and Information Technologies" sector - a total of 336. Second both in number of transactions and in terms of their volume is the "Real Estate and Construction" sector. In 2022, it announced 205 mergers and acquisitions transactions with a total value of 7.82 billion euros. The top three in terms of activity is completed by the "Manufacturing" sector, where a total of 170 transactions were concluded during the year. In terms of volumes of announced deals, the champion in 2022 is the mining industry with a total of 7.98 billion euros. Behind the impressive result, however, there is practically only one transaction - the megadeal for the privatization of the leading Polish gas trader PGNiG from the local oil giant (and revenue leader in the region) PKN Orlen, which EMIS analysts estimate at 7.9 billion euros. In the top three sectors in terms of the total volume of concluded transactions is also energy - with 4.03 billion euros. The largest corporate transfer in Bulgaria for the past year also contributes to this result - that of the KonturGloba Maritsa-East 3 TPP. In it, the second largest coal plant in the country got a new owner after the American group ContourGlobal agreed to sell its business to the fund Kohlberg Kravis Roberts (KKR) for just over 2 billion euros. After a record performance in last year's edition of The Emerging Europe M&A Report, equity deals have maintained a solid performance, albeit at a more modest pace. In 2022, equity investments in the region totaled €9.99 billion, compared to €13.03 billion a year earlier. Their total number increases to 289 compared to 280 for 2021. Equity investors are involved in half of the top 10 deals for the year in the region, CMS and EMIS analysts report.

India has discovered significant deposits of lithium, amounting to 5.9 million tons, DPA reported. The metal is particularly important in the production of batteries for electric vehicles. The deposits, discovered by the Geological Survey of India, are located in the Reasi district of Jammu and Kashmir state. The newly discovered deposits are significant amid estimates that the world's total lithium reserves are around 98 million tonnes. Chile has the largest reserves - 9.3 million tons, followed by Australia - 6.2 million tons, according to data from the US Geological Survey. Lithium is increasingly in demand as it is used in cell phone batteries, laptops, and as a component of the cathodes of all types of lithium-ion batteries for electric vehicles.