Russia

A bankruptcy court on Monday approved Central European Distribution Corp's bankruptcy exit plan, putting Russian billionaire Roustam Tariko on the verge of adding one of the world's largest vodka producers to his stable of companies, Thomson Reuters News & Insight reported. Under the plan, green lighted in U.S. Bankruptcy Court in Wilmington, Tariko will receive all of the Polish company's newly issued stock in return for $277 million he is providing for the benefit of its creditors.

Russia wants to play a bigger part in talks over solving Cyprus' financial problems but will only restructure its loan to the island if its interests here, especially those related to VTB Bank, are protected, Moscow's finance minister said, CyprusMail reported. Russian banks and companies have poured money into Cyprus since the 1990s, taking advantage of low taxes and relaxed business regulations.

A Russian depositor has filed suit for the seizure of all assets in Russia belonging to Laiki Bank of Cyprus, including its controlling stake in Russia’s Rosprombank, which may now hamper a Cypriot plan to sell off the shares, RT.com reported. Presnensky Court in Moscow has received a lawsuit from ‘Y. G. Borisov’ against Laiki Bank – which operates in Russia under the Cyprus Popular Bank brand – and Rosprombank, in which Cyprus owns a 50.4 percent stake. Borisov has demanded the repayment of money that was seized from his account with the Cypriot bank; the exact sum was not disclosed.

Russia's largest banks said Thursday their clients' exposure to losses in Cyprus so far appears modest, while there were few other signs of immediate fallout for Russian business, executives and analysts said, The Wall Street Journal reported. The Kremlin's angry public attacks last week on a planned tax on bank deposits in a tax haven long favored by Russians led many observers to suspect Russians' exposure to Cyprus's troubled banks was substantial. Estimates ran as high as €20 billion ($26 billion) in Russian money said to be at risk.

A unit of Russia's Alfa Group said on Thursday it had withdrawn its proposal to acquire Central European Distribution Corp, one of the world's largest vodka producers, through a restructuring of CEDC's finances. Alfa Group unit A1 said in a two-sentence statement to Reuters that it had officially withdrawn its non-binding offer to restructure CEDC. It also said the two other members of its consortium, CEDC investor Mark Kaufman and SPI Group, which owns Stolichnaya Vodka, had been informed of its decision.

Cyprus has thrown its international reputation as an offshore banking hub into peril after considering a bold plan to levy a one-time tax on deposits, The Wall Street Journal reported. The proposed tax—which would have helped Cyprus raise funds as part of a €10 billion ($13 billion) bailout deal from the European Union and International Monetary Fund—was rejected by Cyprus's Parliament on Tuesday. Cyprus is now scrambling to find other ways to raise the funds. Still, much of the damage appears to have been done. The tax proposal provoked outrage in Moscow.

Boeing Co has sued its Russian and Ukrainian partners in satellite launch service Sea Launch, saying they refused to pay it more than $350 million following the joint-venture's bankruptcy filing in 2009, Reuters reported. The lawsuit, filed in U.S. District Court in Los Angeles on Friday, targeted RSC Energia, a company partially owned by the Russian government, and two Ukrainian state-owned companies, PO Yuzhnoye Mashinostroitelny Zavod and KB Yuzhnoye.

Russia's No. 1 telecoms operator MTS said on Wednesday its Uzbek subsidiary had applied for bankruptcy, Reuters reported. The phone operator had been fighting to restore its Uzbek business after a court revoked its license to operate in August as part of dispute involving a criminal case against local MTS managers and a back-tax claim. MTS was ordered to pay $600 million in fines by an Uzbek court in November.

Russian billionaire Oleg Deripaska’s Kuban Airlines, the country’s 14th biggest, declared bankruptcy and ceased flying today after running up debt and breaching federal regulations, Bloomberg reported. “The main reasons for stopping the airline’s operations are the difficult financial situation and failure to comply with a number of provisions mandated by new federal aviation rules,” Krasnodar-based Kuban Airlines said in a statement on its website. The carrier filed for bankruptcy at the Krasnodar Region Arbitration Court.

OAO Mechel, Russia’s largest producer of steel-making coal, got a year’s breathing space on repayments to a $1 billion loan by signing a restructuring deal with banks, Bloomberg reported. The company, which reported an $823 million loss for the second quarter of the year because of falling coal prices, got banks to agree to an amendment and restatement of the syndicated loan, it said in a statement distributed by Globe Newswire. The facility, maturing in 2015, would have repaid $600 million next year in monthly installments and these will be delayed for 12 months, it said.