Financial news

More than 130 Bulgarian companies that waited over two years to join the European carbon emission trade will be only able to sell free quotas until June 30. The Bulgarian government, for its part, will not get a single euro from Kyoto quotas even though it targeted to make BGN 500 million for 2010 as one of its benchmark measures to shore up its flagging economy. These will be the consequences of a decision by the Secretariat of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change to revoke Bulgaria’s carbon trading accreditation. A UN report under the Framework Convention on Climate Change has exposed “devastating” flaws of Bulgaria’s National System for Evaluation of the Greenhouse Gas Emissions as part of its inspection of the nation’s annual report submitted by the former government in April 2009. 

The crisis has forced Bulgarians to live a life of malnourishment, according to the findings of the survey conducted by the Open Society Foundation and the World Bank. According to experts, 29% of the Bulgarians have ceased buying staples to save money and 8% of the polled confessed they missed meals out of scarcity. The picture of poverty is enhanced by the fact that 41% of Bulgarians have cut low on the communal expenses which means that practically half of Bulgaria has turned off heaters and central heating in the winter. The crisis has forced many parents to stop their children from school or nursery. According to data from the World Bank, the crisis has deprived the Bulgarians from the opportunity not only to eat well but also to take care of their health as 4% of the Bulgarians confessed they could not afford pay the health or pension insurances.

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

Companies

Lukoil Neftochim Burgas oil refinery will became a strategic site for the Black Sea Region and the Balkans after the Centre for Retail Trade in Fuel and Petroleum Products with Romania, Macedonia, Serbia and Bulgaria was set up yesterday. "A total of USD 1.3 bln have been invested in the refinery for a hydrocracking installation which will entirely ensure the deep processing of oil", said Vagit Alekperov, President of Lukoil. He added that such large projects were being developed only in countries with which the oil refining plant was in close relations and where it had the full support of the Government. Prime Minister Boyko Borissov visited the petrochemical plant, as well. The investment in the two facilities amounts to about BGN 600 mln, said experts from the refinery. So far, the Russian refinery near Burgas has invested over USD 1 bln in the plant modernization.

The workers of Bulgaria’s cash-strapped Plovdiv-based cosmetics maker Alen Mak will come out on silent protest today in an effort to salvage the plant from insolvency, the initiative committee said in a statement. The protest is expected to be joined by around 70 percent of the company’s 168 employees. “We believe the company needs a breath of fresh air amidst the crisis,” the protesters said. Alen Mak suspended payments on its bond issue at the beginning of the year as creditors turned down a request for a second extension. Pension insurer Doverie, which is the cosmetic maker’s main bondholder, filed for insolvency for the company. Alen Mak is still plagued by liquidity woes.

Heat Supply-Sofia is going to become a heat accountant and along with other companies to sell and accounted heat meters in apartments of subscribers. Siemens, which produces appliances for heat distribution, has already agreed to work with the Sofia heating utility. Before that, Heat Supply-Sofia has requested such authorization from Techem Services and Brunata Bulgaria, but they refused. This was announced yesterday by the executive director of Sofia heating utility Petko Milevski.

Canada-based mining company has started a diamond drilling program at its Breznik Gold Project in Bulgaria. The program which will total seven holes and approximately 1,000 metres is designed to test the continuation of the currently identified mineral resource. If successful, the drilling will double the strike length of mineralization at the EurOmax project in Breznik to the west of Sofia, the company announced adding that once the drilling is completed it intends to apply for a Commercial Discovery Certificate under Bulgarian mining law. More than one kilometer of the mapped strike length of the vein system near Breznik remains untested, and drilling is expected confirm the potential for the extension of previously identified high grade mineralization to the west, states EurOmax.

A weird contradiction about plans by clean energy company Energoni to raise its capital to BGN 1 billion, a figure unseen for the local market, puzzled the Bulgarian Stock Exchange (BSE) on Thursday. The company said in a press release it is preparing for a capital increase to BGN 1 billion that should take place over the next nine months. The company said it has almost cleared the hurdle that had prevented such a move – its shares were blocked by the Financial Supervision Commission (FSC) over an audit into its first-quarter report ordered by the watchdog. The firm even noted that the auditors Ernst & Young made no remarks or recommendations about any corrections in the report.

Mercator Group - Slovenia's largest retail chain company with department stores and supermarkets in Slovenia, Croatia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Serbia, Montenegro and Albania has prepared to explore the Bulgarian market. The company is planning to pour 50 million euro in the construction of supermarkets in Bulgaria. This became clear during the visit of Bulgaria's economy minister Traycho Traykov in Ljubljana, where he opened a Bulgarian-Slovenian business forum. The investment is to be made by 2011. Mercator Group already has a supermarket in the town of Stara Zagora and they also plan to open two stores in Sofia, one in Varna and one in Bourgas.

Second launching workshop on the Development and Implementation of a National Reference Network for Assessing the Competence of the Workforce by Sectors and Regions took place on 12-13 May 2010 at BIA

Europe

SAP, the world’s largest enterprise software maker, has agreed to buy US rival Sybase in a deal worth $5.8bn, its biggest acquisition in almost three years. The German software group will pay $65 per share in cash for Sybase, SAP said in a statement on Wednesday evening. That represents a 44 per cent premium to the three-month average stock price of the fourth-largest provider of database software. The move extends the rivalry between SAP and US rival Oracle, where Oracle has been the leading database company but is number two to SAP in business management software. Bill McDermott, SAP’s co-chief executive, said the company would benefit hugely from Sybase’s database and mobile application technology.

America

The US trade deficit struck a 15-month high in March, the government said, as growth in both exports and imports suggested economic recovery is gaining steam. The trade deficit widened for the second consecutive month in March to 40.4 billion dollars, an increase of 2.5 percent from February's downwardly revised 39.4 billion dollars, the Commerce Department said. The February reading initially was 39.7 billion dollars. The March gap, led by a huge jump in oil imports, was the biggest since December 2008 and in line with the average analyst forecast of 40.5 billion dollars. The US volume of international trade in goods and services in March reached its highest level since October 2008, the month after the failure of Wall Street investment bank Lehman Brothers led to the worst global recession since World War II.

Asia

Japanese electronics giant Sony announced an annual loss of 40.8 billion yen (440 million dollars), narrowing from a loss of 98.9 billion yen the previous year. The maker of Bravia televisions, PlayStation game consoles and Cyber-shot cameras forecast a profit of 50 billion yen in the year ending March 2011 as it looks to aggressively launch 3D televisions and related products. For the financial year just ended, the company reported an operating profit of 31.8 billion yen compared to a loss of 227.8 billion yen in the previous year, which was its biggest ever. Sony reported its first annual loss in 14 years in fiscal 2008, as the global economic downturn inflicted heavy damage on Japan's high-tech companies.

The Medieval Town of Cherven

The Medieval town of Cherven is the biggest medieval settlement having its own fortress, found in Bulgaria. It is located by the river of Cherni Lom in the region of Polomie. The first traces of man in this region date back to the old stone age. The antique era has also left its tracks. Thracians used to live here. Romans came to these lands in the first century. Later, Bulgarians built their fortresses and fortifications among the rocks. At that time (13-14th century), the Medieval town of Cherven was one of the most important military, administrative, economic, religious and cultural centers in Bulgaria. The first written monuments, mentioning the town, were written in old Bulgarian languages and are dated back to the 11th century. According to them, a king called Gega, also known as Odelyan, established on the territory of Bulgaria the towns Cherven, Nessebar, and Shtip. Cherven is a typical feudatory town, consisting of two parts – the Citadel and the actual town. The walls surrounding the town reach 3 m in thickness. The only completely preserved military tower in Bulgaria is located there. 11 churches have been found on the territory of the town, built in the style of the Tarnovo School of Architecture. Cherven was completely ruined during the Ottoman invasion in 1388, and never came to life again. It has been the object of systematic excavations since 1961.

On that day:  The Rogozen treasure