Latest news with #KSE
Yahoo
5 days ago
- Business
- Yahoo
In wartime Ukraine, a university grows — and reclaims a space once reserved for the corrupt
Once the playground of disgraced Ukrainian politicians, a golf club in Kyiv's Soviet-era Obolon neighborhood is now set to become the new campus of the Kyiv School of Economics, which last month bought the site for $18 million as part of a $40 million investment — the largest private investment in education in Ukraine's independent history. At the opening picnic on the grounds last Sunday, over 2,000 students, alumni, and locals gathered on a territory once reserved for political elites, including scandal-ridden ex-President Viktor Yanukovych and other similarly shameless officials of his time. After the 2014 revolution ousted those officials and Ukraine has seen a broader shift toward Europe, the early 2000s golf club — always more about status than love of sport — languished for years. Starting next year, KSE, one of Ukraine's top private universities, will reopen the site as a new campus focused on expanding its STEM programs to train engineers, mathematicians, and tech professionals needed for the country's defense, recovery, and economy. KSE says it has already hired four mathematics professors from abroad to staff the math degree. The campus will also be open to the public. 'This was a closed elite community — we're very capitalist, but we're going to be socialists on this: Open it,' KSE director Tymofiy Mylovanov tells the Kyiv Independent at the picnic on June 1. KSE began in the '90s with one executive business degree geared toward professionals who wanted to go abroad, and has since grown to 1,500 students across 17 programs — up from 177 students and six programs before the start of the full-scale invasion. The university has quickly outgrown its current building, which it bought in 2020 for $5 million. KSE's rector, Tymofii Brik, says the university, using a mix of 'pragmatism and romanticism,' bet on Ukraine's survival against Russia's full-scale invasion — and its need for engineers to contribute to the war effort and rebuild — by launching new degrees in 2023, a year after the start of the invasion. That year, KSE added programs in psychology, memory studies, law, urban science, cybersecurity, and artificial intelligence. In 2024, the university launched programs in unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) and micro and nano-electronics. The new programs resonated with students who stayed in Ukraine despite the war and wanted to help shape its future, Brik says. 'There's this expression — 'If you build a church, they will come.'' KSE is planning to open the 15,000-square-meter (almost 4 acres, or the size of two soccer fields) grounds to the public and tear down the fences currently separating it from the riverwalk and adjoining public park, taking its inspiration largely from U.S. university campuses. While still small compared to most American universities, it will be the first of its kind in Kyiv. The Ukrainian Catholic University in Lviv has an expansive, open campus. Early conversations with community members, which Brik, who grew up in the area, says the school is committed to engaging in, include an outdoor cinema in the summertime. 'People deserve to have access to this beautiful public space because it belongs to the public — we have no right to close it,' Brik says. No large land deal in Ukraine is without scrutiny — the results of decades of corruption that have led to public mistrust. KSE's announcement is no exception. Some critics have said the purchase price was inflated, while others have pointed out that zoning laws do not allow for a campus to be built on the golf course's grounds, on the riverbank. Mylovanov and Brik have quick answers to the accusations: On pricing, the buildings on the golf course have far more space than people realize; on zoning, they have no plans to build anything for now, and they will maintain some golf activity to comply with the current laws. They also point out that, as a U.S.-registered company — it is not uncommon for Ukrainian organizations and companies to be registered abroad — KSE is subject to rigorous compliance checks on any deals they do. Others have found the wartime investment, in Mylovanov's words, 'cringey.' But for that, too, Mylovanov has a response — first, the school's donors, made up of confidential individuals and organizations from the U.S., U.K., and Europe, want to invest in education, not the military. And second, while defense is critical, education is also a crucial part of the country's long-term security. Looking toward the long-term needs, KSE is partnering with Olin College in the U.S. to co-create a new, interdisciplinary engineering program, says Rebecca Brosseau, who is part of the team developing the new program. Olin itself was founded 30 years ago on the very idea that traditional engineering curricula weren't fostering the creative thinking future engineers needed. Over the next year, Brosseau will recruit around 10 faculty and 10–15 students to launch a pilot program in late 2026, co-developing the curriculum together with the professors, students, and in partnership with Olin. The goal, Brosseau says, is to build an interdisciplinary team that will design courses collaboratively and try 'something completely revolutionary for engineering education and maybe even for higher education — anywhere.' KSE's approach is a far cry from Ukraine's often inefficient, outdated, and even corrupt public education system — a problem of an ingrained culture, not people, says Brik. He believes that at the current moment in Ukraine, only private institutions have the flexibility to drive real reform. 'I would even put it in a very provocative way — if you gave $1 million to a public university right now, nothing would happen; but if you gave $1 million to us or the Ukrainian Catholic University, you would see something meaningful the same year,' Brik says. When asked whether KSE wants to be a role model for Ukraine's education system as a whole, Mylovanov says he's done trying to prove anything to anyone. 'I just want more people in what I call the 'anti-despair' movement,' Mylovanov says, to counteract the defeatist narratives 'by doing something small, but something real.' Read also: With music festival honoring fallen combat medic, Ukrainians reinvent memorial culture We've been working hard to bring you independent, locally-sourced news from Ukraine. Consider supporting the Kyiv Independent.
Business Standard
28-05-2025
- Business
- Business Standard
KSE standalone net profit rises 83.78% in the March 2025 quarter
Sales decline 5.95% to Rs 391.81 crore Net profit of KSE rose 83.78% to Rs 34.79 crore in the quarter ended March 2025 as against Rs 18.93 crore during the previous quarter ended March 2024. Sales declined 5.95% to Rs 391.81 crore in the quarter ended March 2025 as against Rs 416.58 crore during the previous quarter ended March 2024. For the full year,net profit rose 418.51% to Rs 91.31 crore in the year ended March 2025 as against Rs 17.61 crore during the previous year ended March 2024. Sales declined 2.02% to Rs 1649.53 crore in the year ended March 2025 as against Rs 1683.49 crore during the previous year ended March 2024. Particulars Quarter Ended Year Ended Mar. 2025 Mar. 2024 % Var. Mar. 2025 Mar. 2024 % Var. Sales 391.81416.58 -6 1649.531683.49 -2 OPM % 11.696.31 - 7.291.90 - PBDT 48.8127.07 80 125.8333.08 280 PBT 47.1225.73 83 120.2128.34 324 NP 34.7918.93 84 91.3117.61 419
Al Jazeera
23-05-2025
- Business
- Al Jazeera
EU membership, seizing Russia's money needed to rebuild Ukraine: Analysts
Ceasefire negotiations between Russia and Ukraine may soon be under way, but Ukraine's economic recovery will be hobbled unless the European Union fast-tracks the war-torn country's membership and provides hundreds of billions of euros' worth of insurance and investment, experts tell Al Jazeera. 'I think what Ukraine needs is some kind of future where it will have a stable and defendable border, and that will only come, I would think, with EU membership,' historian Phillips O'Brien told Al Jazeera. The US administration of President Donald Trump last month handed Ukraine and Russia a ceasefire proposal that excluded future NATO membership of Ukraine, satisfying a key Kremlin demand and leaving Ukraine without the security guarantees it seeks. 'What business is actually going to take the risk of getting involved there economically?' asked O'Brien. 'With NATO off the table, I think if Ukraine is going to have a chance of rebuilding and being integrated into Europe, it will have to be through a fast-tracked EU membership.' That membership is by no means assured, although the European Commission started negotiations in record time last June, and Ukraine has the support of EU heavyweights like France and Germany. If Ukraine becomes an EU member, it would still face a devastated economy requiring vast investment. The Kyiv School of Economics (KSE) estimated that between Russia's full-scale invasion in February 2022 and November last year, Moscow's onslaught had destroyed $170bn of infrastructure, with the housing, transport and energy sectors most affected. That figure did not include the damage incurred in almost a decade of war in the eastern regions of Luhansk and Donetsk since 2014 or the loss of 29 percent of Ukraine's gross domestic product (GDP) from the invasion in 2022. The estimate also did not put a value on the loss of almost a fifth of Ukraine's territory, which Russia now occupies. That territory contains almost half of Ukraine's unexploited mineral wealth, worth an estimated $12.4 trillion, according to SecDev, a Canadian geopolitical risk firm. It also does not include some types of reconstruction costs, such as chemical decontamination and mine-clearing. The World Bank put the cost of infrastructure damages slightly higher this year, at $176bn, and predicts the cost of reconstruction and recovery at about $525bn over 10 years. Economic war has been part of Russia's strategy since the invasion of Donetsk and Luhansk in 2014, argued Maximilian Hess, a risk analyst and Eurasia expert at the International Institute of Strategic Studies. 'The Kremlin has certainly looted occupied territory, including for coking coal, agricultural products, and iron,' Hess told Al Jazeera. The KSE has estimated Russia stole half a million tonnes of grain, included in the $1.9bn damages bill to the agricultural sector. Using long-range rocketry, Russia also targeted industrial hubs not under its control. Ukraine inherited a series of factories from the Soviet Union, including the Kharkiv Tractor Plant, the Zaporizhia Automobile Plant, the Pivdenmash rocket manufacturer in Dnipro and massive steel plants. 'All were targeted by Russian forces,' wrote Hess in his recent book, Economic War. 'Russia's attacks were, of course, primarily aimed at devastating the Ukrainian economy and weakening its ability and will to fight, but they also raised the cost to the West of supporting Ukraine in the conflict, something the Kremlin hoped would lead to reduced support for Kyiv.' Through occupation and targeting, Russia managed to deprive Ukraine of a flourishing metallurgy sector. According to the United States Geological Survey, metallurgical production decreased by 66.5 percent as a result of the war. That is a vast loss, considering that Ukraine once produced almost a third of the iron ore in Europe, Russia and Central Eurasia, half of the region's manganese ore and a third of its titanium. It remains the only producer of uranium in Europe, an important resource in the continent's quest for greater energy autonomy. Ukraine's claims to have built a $20bn defence industrial base with allied help, a rare wartime economic success story. That can make up for the losses in metallurgy, Hess said, 'but only in part and in different regions of the country from which those mining and metallurgical ones were concentrated. Boosting [metallurgical activities] in places like Kryvyi Rih, Dnipro, Zaporizhzhia, and ideally territory ultimately freed from Russian occupation, will be necessary to win the peace.' Weeks ago, Ukraine and the US signed a memorandum of intent to jointly exploit Ukraine's mineral wealth. Ukraine committed to putting half the proceeds from its metallurgical activities into a Reconstruction Fund, but experts doubted the notion that mineral wealth can rebuild Ukraine. 'Projects have a long launch period … from five to 10 years,' Maxim Fedoseienko, head of strategic projects at the KSE Institute, told Al Jazeera. 'You need to make documentation, environmental impacts assessment, and after that, you can also need three years to build this mine.' The US and EU might invest in such mines, Fedoseienko said, because 'we have more than 24 kinds of materials from the EU list of critical [raw] materials,' but they would only contribute to the Ukrainian economy if investments were equitable. Trump presented the minerals deal as payback for billions in military aid. 'There's nothing remotely fair about it. The aid was not given to be paid back,' said O'Brien. As Fedoseienko put it, 'It is not fair if everyone will say, 'OK, we will help you in a time of war, so you are owned [by] us.'' In addition to fairness, Ukraine needs money. Some of that needs to come in the form of insurance. A state-backed war-risk insurance formula Kyiv reached with the United Kingdom in 2023, for example, brought bulk carriers back to Ukraine's ports and defeated Russian efforts to blockade Ukrainian grain exports. As a result, Ukraine exported 57.5 million tonnes of agricultural goods in 2023-2024, and was on track to export 77 million tonnes in the 2024-2025 marketing year, which ends in June, its agriculture ministry said. 'There needs to be a substantial expansion of public insurance products in particular, as well as a move to seize frozen Russian assets,' said Hess. Seizing some $300bn in Russian central bank money held in the EU was deemed controversial, but the measure is now receiving support. 'The Russian state has committed these war crimes, has broken international law, has done this damage to Ukraine – that actually becomes a just way of helping Ukraine rebuild,' said O'Brien. '[Europeans] have a very strong case for this, but they, right now, lack the political will to do it.' Ukraine's president, Volodymyr Zelenskyy, has already repeatedly asked Europe to use the money for Ukraine's defence and reconstruction. What Europeans have done in the meantime is going some way towards rebuilding Ukraine. Some $300m in interest payments proceeding from Russian assets are diverted to reconstruction each year. A European Commission programme provides 9.3 billion euros ($10.5bn) of financial support designed to leverage investment from the private sector. Financial institutions such as the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development and the European Investment Bank are providing loan guarantees to Ukrainian banks, which gives them liquidity. 'So Ukrainian banks can provide loans to Ukrainian companies to invest and operate in Ukraine. This is a big ecosystem to finance investment and operational needs to the Ukrainian economy,' said Fedoseienko. Together with the finance ministry, the KSE operates an online portal providing information about the various instruments available, which has already helped bring 165 investments to fruition worth $27bn. 'Is it enough to recover the Ukrainian economy?' Fedoseienko asked. 'No, but this is a significant programme to support Ukraine now.'
Time of India
10-05-2025
- Business
- Time of India
India stock market is 245 times Pakistan's stock market! Nifty50 resilient, KSE 100 crashes 9.5% amidst India-Pakistan tensions
India's market demonstrates superior structural strength. (AI image) India-Pakistan tensions : The reaction of stock markets in India and Pakistan to the rising tensions post Pahalgam terror attack and the ongoing Operation Sindoor so far is an indication of India's underlying economic strength. The stock markets of India and Pakistan have shown contrasting responses to the rising tensions. India's Nifty50 has seen a modest decline of 1.52% after Operation Sindoor on May 7, whilst Pakistan's KSE-100 has witnessed a substantial fall of 5.55%. Since the April 22 attack in Jammu and Kashmir's Pahalgam that resulted in 26 tourist casualties, Pakistan's main stock market index KSE has dropped by 9.5%, whereas the Nifty has shown minimal movement with just a 0.66% decrease. This stock market behaviour highlights an important distinction: India's stock market, being 245 times larger than Pakistan's, demonstrates considerably more stability during geopolitical uncertainties. Operation Sindoor 'Pakistan army moving its troops in forward areas': Key takeaways from govt briefing 'Pak used drones, long-range weapons, jets to attack India's military sites' 'Attempted malicious misinformation campaign': Govt calls out Pakistan's propaganda Also Read | 'Too big to fail debtor': India targets Pakistan on IMF bailout package; abstains from voting over misuse of funds for terrorism According to an ET report, India stands amongst the globe's top five equity markets, boasting a total market capitalisation of approximately $5 trillion. In contrast, Pakistan's Karachi Stock Exchange maintains a significantly smaller capitalization of $20.36 billion, according to Bloomberg data. India's market demonstrates superior structural strength with over 5,000 listed companies, backed by substantial involvement from mutual funds, retail investors, and SIPs. This robust domestic foundation helps maintain market stability. Conversely, Pakistan's exchange, listing merely 500 companies, exhibits higher sensitivity to market sentiment and lower liquidity, making it particularly susceptible to sharp declines during political unrest. India's economic fundamentals demonstrate considerable strength. The nation maintains forex reserves of $688 billion, whilst Pakistan holds $15.25 billion. Also Read | Big achievement! India to become 4th largest economy in 2025 overtaking Japan; will be 3rd largest by 2028 Economic analysts suggest that Pakistan would face significantly greater financial repercussions than India in the event of prolonged military conflict, making further aggressive actions highly unfavourable. India stands as the fifth-largest economy globally when measured by nominal GDP, whilst maintaining its position as the fastest-growing major economy. Pakistan, in comparison, fails to secure a position amongst the world's top 40 economies. Moody's, the international credit rating agency, has issued a cautionary assessment regarding Pakistan's economic outlook. The agency stated that heightened tensions with India would adversely affect Pakistan's economic growth and impede governmental fiscal consolidation efforts, thereby undermining the country's progress towards achieving macroeconomic stability. Stay informed with the latest business news, updates on bank holidays and public holidays . AI Masterclass for Students. Upskill Young Ones Today!– Join Now
India.com
01-05-2025
- Business
- India.com
Pakistan in BIG trouble after India implements strong measures to avenge Pahalgam terror attack, country suffers loss of 700000000000 in…, stock exchange to…
India Pakistan New Delhi: The terror attack in Pahalgam, carried out by Pakistan-backed terrorists targeting innocent tourists, has drawn global condemnation. In response to this cowardly act, the Modi government has implemented a slew of measures aimed at holding Pakistan accountable. Without crossing any borders, India has managed to inflict a significant economic blow on the already struggling Pakistani economy. According to the reports, Pakistan's stock market has taken a severe hit due to India's countermeasures. The Pakistani stock market reportedly suffered a loss of nearly Rs 70,000 crore. The Karachi Stock Exchange (KSE) has dropped more than 4.5 percent, and on Tuesday alone, the KSE-100 index fell by over 1,100 points. In contrast, India's stock markets have shown an upward trend, with the Sensex gaining around 1,100 points since the 22nd of the month. Let's take a look at the numbers currently coming out of the Karachi Stock Exchange. Decline for Second Consecutive Day Pakistan's stock market continues to decline for the second consecutive day. The main index of the Pakistan Stock Market, the Karachi Stock Exchange (KSE-100), was trading at 114,007.40 points at 1:40 PM, down by 100 points. Notably, during the trading session, the KSE-100 had dropped as much as 1130.78 points to reach 112,935.57. A day earlier as well, the KSE-100 had seen a decline. At one point, the KSE was trading positively, but after reaching the day's peak, the Karachi Stock Exchange closed with a fall of more than one percent. Experts believe that rising tensions between India and Pakistan are contributing to the decline in Pakistan's stock market. Big Drop After April 22 It is important to note that after April 22, Pakistan's stock market witnessed a steep decline in four out of the last five trading sessions. According to data, the Karachi Stock Exchange (KSE) closed at 118,430.35 points on April 22. Following that, the market declined on April 23 and 24. There was a rise in the KSE-100 index on April 25, but the last two trading days again saw declines. Since April 22, the KSE has fallen by 5,494.78 points — a drop of 4.63 percent. According to experts, Pakistan's stock market may see further decline. Pakistan suffers Rs 70,000 crore blow Over the past week—or more specifically, following the Pahalgam attack—Pakistan's stock market has taken a significant hit. On April 22, the market capitalization of the Karachi Stock Exchange stood at $52.84 billion. However, by April 29, after the KSE-100 index hit a lower level, it had dropped to USD 50.39 billion. This means the Pakistani stock market lost approximately USD 2.45 billion during this period. When converted to Pakistani rupees, this equates to a loss of nearly Rs 70,000 crore.
