For the first time, Forbes presented the rating of "20+5 largest investors of the country". 20 participants of this rating invested UAH 173 billion ($5 billion) in business development during the big war.
Why is this important?
Capital investment is not only about the development of companies, it is also about the growth and future of the economy. The share of investments in GDP during the five pre-war years averaged 15%. The norm of the so-called extended reproduction is an indicator of 20% and above. If less, the economy consumes its own future resources. In fact, this means a slow collapse of the country's economic prospects. In 2023, thanks to business activity and significant state investments, primarily in defense, this indicator was 17%.
Business is picking up momentum: in 2023, the top 20 investors on our list increased CAPEX by 33%. Is it a little or a lot? At first glance, we have growth by a third. On the other hand, the nominal GDP grew not much less – by 25%.
The problem of the Ukrainian economy highlighted by this rating is the small number of large investors. Our top twenty investors account for 25% of all business CAPEX in the country. The second chronic problem is the lack of new foreign investments. Apart from "elders" and mobile operators, there are no new foreigners in the rating.
In addition to metallurgists and energy workers, there are agrarians, telecom operators, retailers, logistics companies, and even a network of gas stations in the top 20 of the rating. It should not be forgotten that the investments of large businesses often create sales of medium and small businesses – through contracts for construction, installation, supply of equipment, etc.
Metinvest took second place in the rating of the country's largest investors. Metinvest would be the champion by a wide margin if the editors made this list in 2021. That year was a record-breaking success for Rinat Akhmetov's metallurgical business, and the $1.3 billion capital investment reflected Metinvest's ambitions. The war caused direct losses to the company in the amount of $3.5 billion: the largest metallurgical plants "Azovstal" and "Ilyich Iron and Steel Works of Mariupol".
The company's CAPEX in 2022-2023 amounted to 22.7 billion hryvnias.
"The investment strategy of the Group is focused on preserving the operability of assets," the company's press service answered. More than $300 million is allocated for this every year. During the war – $659 million. But they add that the Group is still working on the preparatory stages of key strategic projects.
For 2024, the planned volume of capital investments is at the level of the last year – about $319 million.
What will Zaporizhzhia have from it?
Several of the company's enterprises operate in Zaporizhzhia: “Zaporizhstal”, “Zaporizhcoke", "Zaporozhogneupor", and "Zaporizhzhya Casting and Mechanical Works". By the way, during the full-scale invasion, these enterprises brought 5.5 billion hryvnias to the state treasury, including 1.6 billion hryvnias to local budgets.
Earlier, Zaporizhstal reported that during the full-scale war, it allocated more than 1.2 billion hryvnias to support its own production facilities. The main attention was to blast furnace stage - blast furnaces and pelletizing machines, as well as to emissions cleaning equipment, which works in a complex with production equipment and ensures air purification at the level of legal standards. In 2024, Zaporizhstal is expected to implement a capital investment program for the total amount of about 1 billion hryvnias. It is worth noting that the volume of production at the enterprise fell by half: earlier, the General Director of Zaporizhstal Roman Slobodyaniuk confirmed that the plant produced hot metal, steel and rolled products in 2022-2023 as much as in 2021 alone.
Zaporizhcoke also modernized its equipment - in particular, the plant previously announced the overhaul of coke battery No. 2. The work is carried out in the conditions of the current production, the main expected effect is the extension of the service life of the batteries and the reduction of the influence to the environment. The plant confirmed that from the beginning of 2022, it has allocated more than 276 million hryvnias for the capital renewal of the coke batteries.
