Top Czech Business News - Prague Daily Monitor

The number of self-employed people in the Czech Republic grew by 20,447 year-on-year to 977,623 in the first half of 2010, the Czech Social Security Administration (CSSZ) said yesterday.

The budget cuts Finance Minister Miroslav Kalousek (TOP 09) requires from the Interior Ministry clash with the coalition agreement, Interior Minister Radek John (Public Affairs, VV) said yesterday.

Movie theaters reported record CZK 747 million sales in the first half of this year, CZK 195 million higher than a year earlier, and the number of cinema goers increased from 5.623 million to 6.608 million.

State-owned forest company Lesy České republiky raised gross profit to CZK 1.773 billion in the first half of this year from a CZK 55.6 million profit seen a year earlier, LČR Spokesman Zbyněk Boublík told ČTK yesterday.

The largest Czech telecommunications firm Telefonica O2's net profit fell by around a fourth to CZK 4.3 billion in H1 and revenues dropped by 7% to CZK 27.7 billion, according to analysts' estimates.

The number of foreigners with a business licence increased in the Czech Republic by nearly 6,000 on the year to 89,445 at the end of June and by around 1,700 compared to the end of last year.

Spending on food in the Czech Republic fell by CZK 359 per person year-on-year to CZK 22,212 on average owing to a drop in prices, according to a Report on the State of Agriculture for 2009.

The shopping gallery Galerie Butovice in Prague is the first outlet centre in the Czech Republic to have been forfeited to a bank, ING bank of the Netherlands, as the original owner failed to repay the loan, the daily Mladá fronta Dnes reported Friday.

The Finance Ministry will send out a proposal to ministries and other institutions financed by the state budget to cut their spendings, Lidové noviny reported Friday.

The Czech anti-trust office UOHS has uncovered the country's first case of a cartel within public tenders and imposed a 4.9-million-crown fine on five firms that sought orders from the Czech military, UOHS chairman Petr Rafaj told journalists Thursday.

Around 300 shopping centres of different sizes and formats have been operating in the Czech Republic, according to a survey conducted by the company Incoma GfK this year.

Further environmental commitments would threaten the competitiveness of the Czech economy, Environment Minister Pavel Drobil said on Thursday. The ministry is to radically change its position on European climate protection policy. Drobil said he would be "conservative" in the discussion on the possible lowering of the EU limit for CO2 emissions.

A total of 4.476 million passenger cars were registered in the Czech Republic at the end of June, roughly 0.92 percent (41,000 cars) more than at the end of 2009, the Automotive Industry Association (SAP) announced Thursday on the basis of the Central Car Registry data.

The contract on the purchase of four Spanish Casa C-295M aircraft for the Czech military is valid even though Spain is no longer interested in exchanging one of them for five Czech-made assault planes L-159, Defence Minister Alexandr Vondra (Civic Democrats, ODS) told journalists Thursday.

The Czech Republic fell on the chart of the world's biggest recipients of foreign investments from the 44th place in 2008 to the 57th position last year, according to a recently-released report.

Czech glass maker Moser ended with a loss of Kc8.38m last year against a loss of Kc51.17m posted in the same year-ago period, the firm said in its annual report.

Czech builder Zakladani staveb saw its 2009 net profit fall by 50 percent to CZK 61.2m and sales rose to CZK 3.2bn from 2008's CZK 2.3bn, according to the firm's annual report.

Czech car makers produced 559,000 cars in the Czech Republic in H1 2010, an increase of 18 percent on the year, the Automotive Industry Association (SAP) said.

The Czech government wants to start indexing old-age pensions in dependence of inflation as of 2012, instead of the present indexation based on the real wages' growth, daily Hospodarske noviny (HN) writes Tuesday, adding that the change would help the state save 5.5 billion crowns.

The Finance Ministry will propose that ministries cut another CZK 10 billion from their spending this year in order to keep the public finance gap at 5.3% of GDP, the ministry's spokesman said.