1 PRIME MINISTER OYUN-ERDENE VISITS EGIIN GOL HYDROPOWER PLANT PROJECT SITE WWW.MONTSAME.MN PUBLISHED:2025/04/30      2 ‘I FELT CAUGHT BETWEEN CULTURES’: MONGOLIAN MUSICIAN ENJI ON HER BEGUILING, BORDER-CROSSING MUSIC WWW.THEGUARDIAN.COM PUBLISHED:2025/04/30      3 POWER OF SIBERIA 2: ECONOMIC OPPORTUNITY OR GEOPOLITICAL RISK FOR MONGOLIA? WWW.THEDIPLOMAT.COM PUBLISHED:2025/04/29      4 UNITED AIRLINES TO LAUNCH FLIGHTS TO MONGOLIA IN MAY WWW.MONTSAME.MN PUBLISHED:2025/04/29      5 SIGNATURE OF OIL SALES AGREEMENT FOR BLOCK XX PRODUCTION WWW.RESEARCH-TREE.COM  PUBLISHED:2025/04/29      6 MONGOLIA ISSUES E-VISAS TO 11,575 FOREIGNERS IN Q1 WWW.XINHUANET.COM PUBLISHED:2025/04/29      7 KOREA AN IDEAL PARTNER TO HELP MONGOLIA GROW, SEOUL'S ENVOY SAYS WWW.KOREAJOONGANGDAILY.JOINS.COM  PUBLISHED:2025/04/29      8 MONGOLIA TO HOST THE 30TH ANNUAL GENERAL MEETING OF ASIA SECURITIES FORUM WWW.MONTSAME.MN PUBLISHED:2025/04/29      9 BAGAKHANGAI-KHUSHIG VALLEY RAILWAY PROJECT LAUNCHES WWW.UBPOST.MN PUBLISHED:2025/04/29      10 THE MONGOLIAN BUSINESS ENVIRONMENT AND FDI: CHALLENGES AND OPPORTUNITY WWW.MELVILLEDALAI.COM  PUBLISHED:2025/04/28      849 ТЭРБУМЫН ӨРТӨГТЭЙ "ГАШУУНСУХАЙТ-ГАНЦМОД" БООМТЫН ТЭЗҮ-Д ТУРШЛАГАГҮЙ, МОНГОЛ 2 КОМПАНИ ҮНИЙН САНАЛ ИРҮҮЛЭВ WWW.EGUUR.MN НИЙТЭЛСЭН:2025/04/30     ХУУЛЬ БУСААР АШИГЛАЖ БАЙСАН "БОГД УУЛ" СУВИЛЛЫГ НИЙСЛЭЛ ӨМЧЛӨЛДӨӨ БУЦААВ WWW.NEWS.MN НИЙТЭЛСЭН:2025/04/30     МЕТРО БАРИХ ТӨСЛИЙГ ГҮЙЦЭТГЭХЭЭР САНАЛАА ӨГСӨН МОНГОЛЫН ГУРВАН КОМПАНИ WWW.EAGLE.MN НИЙТЭЛСЭН:2025/04/30     "UPC RENEWABLES" КОМПАНИТАЙ ХАМТРАН 2400 МВТ-ЫН ХҮЧИН ЧАДАЛТАЙ САЛХИН ЦАХИЛГААН СТАНЦ БАРИХААР БОЛОВ WWW.EAGLE.MN НИЙТЭЛСЭН:2025/04/30     ОРОСЫН МОНГОЛ УЛС ДАХЬ ТОМООХОН ТӨСЛҮҮД ДЭЭР “ГАР БАРИХ” СОНИРХОЛ БА АМБИЦ WWW.EGUUR.MN НИЙТЭЛСЭН:2025/04/30     МОНГОЛ, АНУ-ЫН ХООРОНД ТАВДУГААР САРЫН 1-НЭЭС НИСЛЭГ ҮЙЛДЭНЭ WWW.MONTSAME.MN НИЙТЭЛСЭН:2025/04/29     ЕРӨНХИЙ САЙД Л.ОЮУН-ЭРДЭНЭ ЭГИЙН ГОЛЫН УЦС-ЫН ТӨСЛИЙН ТАЛБАЙД АЖИЛЛАЖ БАЙНА WWW.MONTSAME.MN НИЙТЭЛСЭН:2025/04/29     Ц.ТОД-ЭРДЭНЭ: БИЧИГТ БООМТЫН ЕРӨНХИЙ ТӨЛӨВЛӨГӨӨ БАТЛАГДВАЛ БУСАД БҮТЭЭН БАЙГУУЛАЛТЫН АЖЛУУД ЭХЛЭХ БОЛОМЖ БҮРДЭНЭ WWW.MONTSAME.MN НИЙТЭЛСЭН:2025/04/29     MCS-ИЙН ХОЁР ДАХЬ “УХАА ХУДАГ”: БНХАУ, АВСТРАЛИТАЙ ХАМТРАН ЭЗЭМШДЭГ БАРУУН НАРАНГИЙН ХАЙГУУЛЫГ УЛСЫН ТӨСВӨӨР ХИЙЖЭЭ WWW.EGUUR.MN НИЙТЭЛСЭН:2025/04/29     АМ.ДОЛЛАРЫН ХАНШ ТОГТВОРЖИЖ 3595 ТӨГРӨГ БАЙНА WWW.EGUUR.MN НИЙТЭЛСЭН:2025/04/29    

Events

Name organizer Where
MBCC “Doing Business with Mongolia seminar and Christmas Receptiom” Dec 10. 2024 London UK MBCCI London UK Goodman LLC

NEWS

64x64

Snap pops 9 percent after winning second 'buy' recommendation www.reuters.com

 
Shares of Snap Inc (SNAP.N) jumped 9 percent on Wednesday after the owner of messaging app Snapchat received a second analyst "buy" rating following a red-hot public listing this month and with Wall Street skeptical about its lofty valuation.
 
The listing on March 1 was the largest by a technology firm in three years, but trading has been volatile, with many investors critical of lack of profitability and decelerating user growth.
 
Snap's stock was up 7.1 percent at $21.84 early Wednesday afternoon and traders bought call options contracts at the fastest pace since they first became available on March 10, according to options analytics firm Trade Alert.
 
A call conveys the right to purchase shares at a fixed price and is usually used to bet on share price gains.
 
In the newest vote of confidence for Snap, Drexel Hamilton analyst Brian White on Tuesday launched coverage with a "buy" rating and a $30 target price.
 
"We view Snap as a platform for the imagination that unlocks the creativity of its users and allows uninhibited expression with friends. Snap is a fun place to spend time which can be monetized," White wrote in a note to clients.
 
The Los Angeles-based company's app, which allows users to share short-lived messages and pictures, is popular with young people but faces intense competition from larger rivals such as Facebook Inc's (FB.O) Instagram. Snap has warned it may never become profitable.
 
Based on the analysts' average buy, sell and neutral recommendations, Snap has the second-worst rating among 282 U.S. companies that have a market capitalization of at least $20 billion, according to Thomson Reuters data. The worst-rated is Sprint Corp (S.N).
 
Most analysts do not expect the stock to rise over the next year.
 
Including White, two analysts now recommend buying Snap's stock, while five recommend selling, and four have "neutral" ratings, according to Thomson Reuters data. Their median price target is $21.
 
In its first two days of trading, Snap surged 59 percent from its $17 initial public offering price.
...


64x64

London-Paris electric flight 'in decade' www.bbc.com

 
A new start-up says that it intends to offer an electric-powered commercial flight from London to Paris in 10 years.
Its plane, yet to go into development, would carry 150 people on journeys of less than 300 miles.
Wright Electric said by removing the need for jet fuel, the price of travel could drop dramatically.
British low-cost airline Easyjet has expressed its interest in the technology.
"Easyjet has had discussions with Wright Electric and is actively providing an airline operator's perspective on the development of this exciting technology," the airline told the BBC.
However, significant hurdles need to be overcome if Wright Electric is to make the Wright One, pictured above, a reality.
The company is relying heavily on innovation in battery technology continuing to improve at its current rate. If not, the firm will not be able to build in enough power to give the plane the range it needs.
Industry experts are wary of the company's claims. Graham Warwick, technology editor of Aviation Weekly, said such technology was a "long way away".
"The battery technology is not there yet," he told the BBC.
"It's projected to come but it needs a significant improvement. Nobody thinks that is going to happen anytime soon. And there's all the [safety] certification - those rules are yet to be created, and that takes time."
The company is yet to produce a plane of its own and is instead working alongside American inventor Chip Yates, whose own electric aircraft, the Long-ESA, holds the world record for fastest electric aircraft.
Wright Electric's competitors include aviation giant Airbus, which has been developing its electric two-seater plane E-Fan since 2014, and has stated plans to create its own short-haul electric aeroplane seating 70 to 90 passengers.
'Less loud'
Wright Electric is backed by Y Combinator, Silicon Valley's most highly-regarded start-up incubator programme. Alumni of the scheme include companies such as AirBnB, file storage company Dropbox and HR management software firm Zenefits.
Wright Electric's goal, detailed in a presentation given to potential investors on Tuesday, is to make all short-haul flights electric-powered within the next 20 years, which would be about 30% of all flights made globally.
The company said that as well as lower fuel costs for the airlines, the technology could have a major added benefit for the public.
"Depending on how it's designed, you can have an electric plane that's substantially less loud than a fuel plane," said Jeff Engler, Wright Electric's co-founder.
Batteries would be charged separately, he said, meaning planes would not have to sit on the tarmac while power is replenished.
"The way we've designed our plane is to have modular battery packs for quick swap using the same cargo container that's in a regular airplane," Mr Engler said.
"We want it to be as fast as possible, so airlines can keep their planes in the air as long as possible and cover their costs."
Other technology start-ups are seeking to innovate within the aviation industry.
Boom, a company backed by Sir Richard Branson, is developing a Concorde-like supersonic jet. It hopes to achieve London to New York in three-and-a-half hours, a journey which currently takes more than eight hours. It is expected to run test flights later this year.
...


64x64

President Ts.Elbegdorj meets UNSG's Special Envoy for Road Safety www.en.montsame.mn

 
Ulaanbaatar /MONTSAME/ On March 22, the President of Mongolia Ts.Elbegdorj welcomed Jean Todt, United Nations Secretary-General's Special Envoy for Road Safety and President of the Fédération Internationale de l'Automobile (FIA). During his visit to Mongolia, Mr. Jean Todt worked at the Ministry of Road and Transport and the Traffic Police Department.
 
Mr. Jean Todt met with the authorities of the organizations and exchanged views on road and traffic safety issues.
 
The UN proclaimed the period 2011–2020 as a Decade of Action for Road Safety. At the meeting with the President of Mongolia, Mr. Jean Todt expressed that UN will support Mongolia’s effort to join the UN road safety conventions.
...


64x64

Plans for coal-fired power plants drop by almost half in 2016 www.bbc.com

 
Twenty-sixteen saw a "dramatic" decline in the number of coal-fired power stations in pre-construction globally.
The authors of a new study say there was a 48% fall in planned coal units, with a 62% drop in construction starts.
The report, from several green campaign groups, claims changing policies and economic conditions in China and India were behind the decline.
However, the coal industry argues the fuel will remain essential to economic growth in Asia for decades to come.
Rapid swing
Between 2006 and 2016, India and China together accounted for 85% of the coal plants built around the world.
But according to the Boom and Bust 2017 report, put together by Greenpeace, the Sierra Club and CoalSwarm, there has been a huge swing away from coal in these two countries in just 12 months.
The main causes of the decline are the imposition of restrictive measures by China's central government - with the equivalent of 600 coal-fired units being put on hold until at least 2020.
The Indian go-slow was prompted, according to the authors, by the reluctance of banks to provide funds. Work at 13 locations is currently not going ahead.
However, there have also been significant retirements of coal plants in Europe and the US over the past two years, with roughly 120 large units being taken out of commission.
"This has been a messy year, and an unusual one," said Ted Nace, director of CoalSwarm.
"It's not normal to see construction frozen at scores of locations, but central authorities in China and bankers in India have come to recognize overbuilding of coal plants as a major waste of resources.
"However abrupt, the shift from fossil fuels to clean sources in the power sector is a positive one for health, climate security, and jobs. And by all indications, the shift is unstoppable."
The study comes as other groups analyse the potential for investments in coal to become stranded assets if governments continue to restrict CO2 emissions. The International Energy Agency (IEA) says that hundreds of billions of dollars could be at risk.
"The decline in new coal plants in Asian countries is truly dramatic, and shows how a perfect storm of factors is simply making coal a bad investment," said Paul Massara, now of North Star Solar but a former CEO of RWE npower.
"Growing awareness of the air pollution problems coal causes, the impact of policies to tackle climate change, and the rapid growth and cost-competitiveness of renewable sources of energy, along with emerging battery technologies, are making new coal plants redundant before they are even built," he said.
However, the World Coal Association vehemently disagrees. It says the complexity of large infrastructure projects means that until they break ground, it's no surprise if they don't go ahead.
"Yes, China, is reducing the number of coal-stations but not because it's transitioning away from coal. Instead, the new dynamics is a signal of a more developed economy," said Benjamin Sporton.
"Contrary to the picture being portrayed by certain quarters, China's climate pledge suggests that coal will continue to be central to its energy solutions, albeit through efficiencies including the use of new coal technologies.
"In India's case, it's simply not true that renewables are displacing coal. The International Energy Agency has said that India's coal demand will see the biggest growth over next five years with an annual average growth rate of 5% by 2021.
"For these countries, excluding coal from the energy mix is not an option; it is essential for economic growth and critical in securing energy access."
According to the authors of the study, the slowdown brings the possibility of keeping global warming under 2 degrees C since pre-industrial times "within feasible reach."
However, the study says that much more progress needs to be made to reduce the number of coal-fired plants under development in Vietnam, Indonesia, Turkey, Japan and elsewhere.
...


64x64

UK airlines must have EU base after Brexit or lose major routes – report www.rt.com

Brussels has warned that unless airlines like EasyJet and Ryanair move their headquarters from the UK or sell shares to European nationals, they will lose profitable European routes, reports the Guardian.
 
If airlines want to continue flying routes like Milan to Paris, they will be forced to have their headquarters based on the territory of the European Union and a majority of their capital shares must be EU-owned.
 
This ruling will also affect the Dublin-based Ryanair. At present, it complies with the rules by having 60 percent of shares owned by the European investors. However, after Britain triggers Article 50, the amount will be reduced to 40 percent, and may force the company to buy out some UK shareholders.
 
While British Airways doesn’t fly intra-Europe, its parent company IAG will be forced to sell off shares to comply with EU rules.
 
“We will continue to comply with the relevant ownership and control regulations,” an IAG spokesman told Guardian.
 
Experts say this is likely to hurt British workers, as companies will shift jobs to the newly-established European companies.
 
“It might be that carriers choose to have domestic flights [on the continent] operated by their new European operating licence, which would probably mean a reduction in staff in the UK,” Thomas van der Wijngaart, an aviation expert at the legal firm Clyde & Co, told the Guardian.
 
The UK could respond by introducing ownership laws of its own, which could stop Dublin-based Ryanair from flying UK domestic routes, the newspaper noted.
...


64x64

Pricey diving tours to Titanic shipwreck to begin in 2018 www.rt.com

 
British luxury travel company Blue Marble Private has started seling expensive tickets to the wreck site of the legendary Titanic.
The first 'Dive the Titanic' trip is scheduled for May 2018 at the cost of about $105,000 per person. Adjusted for inflation, the figure is equal to the price of an original Titanic first class ticket.
 
The eight-day tour will start with a helicopter ride from the city of St. John’s in Newfoundland, Canada to a yacht anchored near the Titanic’s resting place.
 
Travelers will spend the first half of the journey learning how to operate sonars and use underwater navigation systems. Explorers, scientists and expedition crew will tell the divers about the workings of the ship.
 
Then, the voyagers will get a chance to reach depths of 4,000 meters in a specially designed titanium and carbon-fiber submersible, guided by a crew of experts.
 
“You will glide over the ship’s deck and famous grand staircase capturing a view that very few have seen, or ever will,” the company’s website says.
 
The dive will last three hours assisting the expedition team in the submersible and aboard the expedition yacht.
 
“During the dive, your crew may conduct 3D and 2D sonar scans or search for one of the ship's giant boilers, enormous propellers, and other landmarks of this famous vessel,” said Blue Marble Private founder Elizabeth Ellis as quoted by CNN.
 
Further missions are planned for 2019, according to Ellis.
 
Blue Marble Private specializes in organizing extraordinary travel experiences around the world, providing its wealthy clients with luxury tailor-made trips to far-away corners of the globe.
...


64x64

Mongolia discusses wastewater as resource www.en.montsame.mn

Ulaanbaatar /MONTSAME/ World Water Day which is internationally marked on March 22, today sheds a light on wastewater this year, and Mongolia enriched the theme with ‘resource’, thus making a slogan ‘Wastewater – Resource’.
 
Promoting the slogan, a number of events is taking place Wednesday, March 22, and one of them is ‘Wastewater – Resource’ forum co-organized by the Ministry of Environment and Tourism, Mongolian National Chamber of Commerce and Industry, World Wildlife Fund, Promotion of mining infrastructure investment project, Mongolian Environmental Civil Council, Water Supply and Sewerage Authority of Mongolia and Mongolian University of Life Sciences. In conjunction with the forum, the National Chamber of Commerce and Industry is also hosting an expo of water saving technologies at its building.
 
The Ministry of Environment and Tourism also collaborates with Mongolian Student Association to organize the 12th ‘Water – Key to Development’ academic conference among students on World Water Day. Open to any student from private and public universities and colleges, the academic conference invites 25 topics for presentation including surface water resources, climate change and hydrology, pasture watering, urban water supply system and its optimization, water sufficiency and quality, water and health and water and tourism.
 
Furthermore, a promotional event named ‘Introducing Eurasian Beaver’ was organized by Fresh Water Resources and Nature Conservation Center of the Ministry of Environment and Tourism in cooperation with Mayor’s Office and Beaver domestication unit to mark World Water Day today.
...


64x64

Apple drives further into Facebook, Snap territory with video app www.reuters.com

 
With the release of a new video app called Clips, Apple Inc is inching one step closer to fully engaging in the messaging world, where its huge base of iPhone users could help it compete with Snap Inc's Snapchat and Facebook Inc's Messenger.
 
Clips, which will hit Apple's App Store in April, lets customers take videos and add animated captions and titles, complete with colorful emoji symbols. The app also makes it possible to stitch together multiple video clips and add speech bubbles and filters.
 
The functions closely resemble those that drive Snap's wildly popular Stories feature. With Stories, Snap users string together photos and videos, embellish them and then post them to their feeds.
 
Apple's new Clips lets users post their video to Instagram, Facebook, YouTube, Vimeo and more. But if users post them to Apple's own Messages app, Apple will recommend whom to share it with based on which friends are in the videos and whom the user frequently contacts - the kind of predictive social features Facebook excels at.
 
Apple has a huge number of users for Messages, the flagship app for short notes that is built into the iPhone's iOS 10 software. Apple does not say how many people use the app, but it does say that there more than 1 billion iOS devices on the market and that 79 percent of them run iOS 10.
 
Apple also says that Messages is the most commonly used app on iOS devices, giving the company potentially up to 800 million users for its latest messaging platform. Snap, by contrast, has 161 million daily active users. While Apple's Clips competitor will technically be a separate app from Messages, it will be tied closely to it for the ability share Clips videos with other Apple users.
 
Facebook has more than 1 billion users for both Messenger, which was split off from the main Facebook service in 2014, and for WhatsApp, which it acquired for $19 billion the same year.
 
Apple has been steadily matching the features of Facebook's Messenger. But Apple is also walking a fine line with other messaging players, cooperating with them often as it competes with them. For example, it has opened up the iPhone's dialer app, long closed off to developers, so that iPhone users could place and receive Skype and WhatsApp calls through the device's native interface.
 
Alphabet Inc's Google and Microsoft Corp have been scrambling to get into the game, too. Google has more than a half dozen messaging apps, including Allo, its latest. Microsoft has tried to integrate chat into its Skype app, and Microsoft-owned LinkedIn is a popular tool for business notes.
 
But tech giants obsess over messaging because it is where users are headed, according to analyst firm Gartner. Between 2015 and 2016, the percentage of U.S. and UK smartphone owners who used social media apps dropped from 85 percent to 83 percent while messaging apps jumped from 68 percent to 71 percent, a trend Gartner expects will continue.
...


64x64

Copper price falls on Grasberg production resumption www.mining.com

 
In New York on Tuesday copper for delivery in May suffered a second day of markdowns trading at $2.6075 per pound or $5,750 a tonne as output disruptions at the world's biggest mines appear to be closer to being resolved. Copper is down more than 3% this week.
 
Reuters reports Tuesday that top listed copper producer Freeport McMoRan's giant Grasberg mine in Indonesia had resumed staged copper concentrate production following a strike at a domestic refinery in which the US company owns a minority stake after a 38-day hiatus.
 
Grasberg remains under a concentrate export ban as Freeport negotiates a new operating licence and ownership agreements with the Asian nation. Last month Phoenix-Arizona-based Freeport said it does not foresee a return to business as usual at its 90%-owned operating subsidiary in the country.
 
Freeport Indonesia has suspended capital investments at the remote mine in Papua province and reduced production to roughly 40% of normal levels. In January Freeport said for each month of delay in obtaining approval to export, the Indonesian subsidiary's share of production is projected to be reduced by approximately 32,000 tonnes of copper and 100,000 ounces of gold.
 
In Peru, a 1,300-worker strong strike at Freeports' Cerro Verde mine which recently underwent a massive expansion is set to end on Thursday on government orders, but the union vowed to down tools again on Friday. Workers walked off the job 11 days ago and according to the union production at the mine is running at 50% after Freeport brought contract workers onto the site.
 
Cerro Verde, controlled by Freeport with a 53.6% stake, Sumitomo Metal (21%) and Buenaventura (19.6%), produced just under 500,000 tonnes of the red metal last year, making it the South American nation's top producer.
 
Copper also came under pressure from reports that talks to resolve the strike at Escondida, the world's largest copper operation by a wide margin, are back on. The main union representing 2,500 workers at the Chilean mine told reporters after meeting with part owner and operator BHP Billiton on Monday "that it was open to further conversations that could lead to reopening negotiations."
 
The strike is already in its 40th day. The previous labour strike in 2006 ended after 25 days while the current wage deal was signed four years ago when copper was trading around $3.40 a pound.
 
In its annual financial results BHP said it expected full-year production at Escondida of 1.07 million tonnes, which gives the mine a nearly 5% shares of global primary copper production.
 
BHP, which operates and majority owns the mine with fellow Melbourne diversified giant Rio Tinto, declared force majeure at the mine on February 10 sending the copper price to its highest since May 2015.
 
In a research note quoted on Monday at Barron's, Bank of America Merrill Lynch said it's keeping a $3.00 per pound mid-year price target for copper due to stronger demand and the "meaningful" impact of supply disruptions.
...


64x64

Deputy Minister remarks on scientific aspects of agriculture sector www.en.montsame.mn

 
Ulaanbaatar /MONTSAME/ “There are over 200 technologies and products that can immediately find their application in production”, remarked J.Saule, Deputy Minister for Food, Agriculture and Light Industry during a meeting of the Ministry’s sub-council on science and technology.
 
The meeting was held last Friday to discuss economic and technological aspects of animal husbandry, veterinary, farming, plant protection, food, light industry and agriculture sectors.
 
“About 30 percent of seed sorts, 100 percent of potato sorts, 60 percent of vegetable sorts and 70 percent of fruit sorts studied and certified by scientists are being planted in Mongolia”, she said. Moreover in animal husbandry sector, 1 horse breed and 3 varieties, 3 camel breeds, 3 cattle breeds, 22 sheep breeds and 4 goat breeds and 5 varieties have been newly certified.
 
The Deputy Minister continued on her report, “4 discoveries of Mongolian veterinary researchers have been internationally acknowledged, and 64 animal vaccinations and 72 drugs and supplements have been invented”.
 
In 2008-2016, 72 science, technology projects and 5 innovation projects were implemented in the science & technology areas of food, agriculture and light industry sectors, using MNT 5.5 billion fund from the Science and Technology Fund.
 
“As such, we can tackle our challenges relying on the intellectual capacities of our scientists”, the Deputy Minister noted.
...