Secret Registry of Russian Property Abroad, Drone Competence Center: Essentials April 28

World

• Pavel Durov allowed Telegram to leave Brazil. He thus reacted to the request of the Brazilian justice to block the messenger for refusing to deliver the personal data of the users to the police. Durov recalled Telegram’s mission, which is to “preserve privacy and freedom of expression around the world.” The businessman described a possible exit from Brazil as preferable to the “betrayal of users.”

• European depository Euroclear received 734 million euros in revenue in the first quarter of the year for investing in frozen Russian assets. Revenues for this period are 971 million euros (+871%), net profit is 796 million euros (+95%). The company acknowledges the impact of sanctions against Russia on financial performance.

• Intel reported its biggest quarterly loss in its history and a 36% decline in revenue. Tech giants’ financial performance is slipping amid the semiconductor overproduction crisis: Samsung reported a 95% drop in profit the day before.
• Mark Zuckerberg became rich by $ 10 billion in one day. The fortune of the founder of Meta (recognized as an extremist in the Russian Federation and banned) grew due to a sharp increase in the company’s share price. Investors liked its report for the first quarter of this year.
• Microsoft will stop producing computer accessories under its own brand. Instead, the corporation will promote the same products under the Surface brand. The company will sell the rest of the accessories under the Microsoft brand at current prices.
• The Clubhouse social network, which has lost popularity, will lay off half of its employees. The company needs to evolve, so it needs to be restarted, the founders said. All laid off workers will receive wages until the end of August.

Russia

• For the fifth time in a row, the Bank of Russia kept its key rate at 7.5% per annum. At the same time, the regulator “in the context of a gradual increase in inflationary pressure” in the next meetings will evaluate the possibility of raising the rate to stabilize inflation close to 4% in 2024 and beyond.

• The Ministry of Finance proposed to create a secret register of Russian property abroad. The department has submitted a relevant bill, which is now being discussed, reports Kommersant.

• Russian cinemas have reached the pre-pandemic level of fees, said Vladimir Tolstoy, adviser to the president of the Russian Federation on culture. For four months of the year, its profitability even exceeded the figures for 2019. Today, cinemas do not need additional support measures.

• Almost half of Russians in the first quarter of 2023 made free or paid subscriptions to online cinemas, calculated in GfK. Of the 49% of residents with such subscriptions, 21.1% prefer Kinopoisk. In second and third place: “Evie” and Wink.

Business

• VK from May 1 will stop disclosing news about the company on the London Stock Exchange (LSE). The holding company did not receive consent for the major service provider’s cooperation in publishing press releases and said it would continue to publish information on its corporate website and the Interfax Corporate Information Disclosure Center website.

• Wildberries marketplace plans to enter the markets of Azerbaijan, Georgia and Tajikistan, said Tatyana Bakalchuk, founder and CEO of the online platform. In addition, according to her, the company wants to “redraw” the logo, since they believe that the brand is “somewhat out of date”.

• Day One Ventures Masha Bucher Last name – Bucher, which can sound like Bucher, Booker, Bucher or Bushehr. and others have invested $5 million in the Posh event platform. The funding will be used to expand the team, work on new features, and update the mobile app.
• According to Kommersant, Russian representative offices of international companies and legal entities that have not been sanctioned receive offers from the American Microsoft to renew the license of their software.
• The Russian authorities allowed Continental to sell the Kaluga tire plant to S8 Capital. The cost of the transaction may amount to 7-10 billion rubles, which is comparable to the 87 million euros, at which Continental itself estimated the asset, writes Kommersant.
• Intel’s first-quarter revenue fell 36% year-on-year to $11.7 billion. This marks the fifth straight quarter of a decline in sales for one of the biggest chipmakers and the second straight quarter with losses, CNBC reports. .
• The founder of the Amedia film company, Alexander Akopov, has resigned from the board of directors of the Amediateka online cinema, RBC has learned. It happened on November 22 of last year. The next day, November 23, the producer headed the STS channel. In February, Akopov was included in the 10th package of EU sanctions.

Technologies

• The Ministry of Digital Development will create a new drone competence center. Among its tasks is the creation of a digital platform for market participants, as well as a number of information systems and hardware solutions (for example, a simulator for learning to control drones manually), reported Forbes.
• Another large IT company has started work on creating its own analogue of ChatGPT. Huawei has filed a trademark application with the China Patent Office for NetGPT. The company has previously stated that it will not integrate ChatGPT into its products.

Transport

• Several Russian airports have switched or plan to switch this year to the national platform for general access to ARCute passenger check-in systems, Izvestia learned.