Report on payments to governments for FY2016

RNS Number : 6437I

Polymetal International PLC

21 June 2017

 

Release time	IMMEDIATE
Date	21 June 2017

Polymetal International plc

Report on payments to governments for the year 2016

Polymetal International plc (LSE, MOEX: POLY, ADR: AUCOY) (together with its subsidiaries - "Polymetal", the "Company", or the "Group") issues the report on payments to government for the year ended 31 December 2016.

INTRODUCTION

This Report provides an overview of the payments to governments made by Polymetal International plc and its subsidiary undertakings (hereinafter referred to as "Polymetal") for the year 2016 as required under the UK's Report on Payments to Governments Regulations 2014 (as amended in December 2015). These UK Regulations enact domestic rules in line with Directive 2013/34/EU (the EU Accounting Directive (2013)) and apply to large extractive companies, whose securities are publicly listed on a UK-regulated stock market,  that are involved in the exploration, prospection, discovery, development and extraction of minerals, oil, natural gas deposits or other materials. This Report is also intended to satisfy the requirements of the Disclosure and Transparency Rules of the Financial Conduct Authority in the United Kingdom.

BASIS OF PREPARATION

Legislation

This report is prepared in accordance with The Reports on Payments to Governments Regulations 2014 as enacted in the UK in December 2014 and as amended in December 2015.

Reporting entities

This Report includes payments to governments made by Polymetal plc and its subsidiary undertakings. Payments made by entities over which Polymetal has joint control or significant influence are excluded from this Report. For the entities, acquired during the reporting period, payments to governments are reported from the acquisition date, namely for Kapan MPC CJSC and JSC Komarovskoye Mining Company from 28 April 2016 and 1 August 2016, respectively.

Activities

Payments made by Polymetal to governments arising from activities involving the exploration, prospection, discovery, development and extraction of minerals are disclosed in this Report. It excludes payments related to refining activities made to the refineries owned by the government agencies and any payments which are not directly attributable to the production and exploration activities.

Government

Government includes any national, regional or local authority of a country, and includes a department, agency or entity that is a subsidiary of a government.

Project

Payments are reported at project level except that payments that are not attributable to a specific project are reported at legal entity level. Project is defined as operational activities which are governed by a single contract, or licence agreement, and form the basis for payment liabilities with a government. If such agreements are substantially interconnected, those agreements are to be treated as a single project.

"Substantially interconnected" means forming a set of operationally and geographically integrated contracts, or licence agreements that are signed with a government giving rise to payment liabilities. Indicators of integration include, but are not limited to, geographic proximity, the use of shared infrastructure and common operational management.

License agreements are aggregated for the purposes of reporting as a single project only when those legal agreements have substantially similar terms and are both geographically and operationally integrated. Based on these principles Dukat and Lunnoye projects (JSC Magadan Silver) were aggregated for the purposes of reporting for the year ended 31 December 2016.

Payments

The information is reported under the following payment types:

Income taxes

These are taxes paid by Polymetal on its income and profits in accordance with legislation enacted in the applicable jurisdiction. Payments are reported net of refunds. Value added tax, personal income taxes, social taxes, property taxes are excluded.

The maximum income tax in Russia is set at 20% and is allocated between federal budget and he budgets of the relevant constituent regions. In 2015 and 2016 the following proportion was applied: 2% to the federal budget, whereas 18% allocated to the regional budgets. From 1 January 2016 Omolon Gold Mining Company LLC and JSC Magadan Silver are entitled to the decreased statutory income tax rate of 18% for the operations held in the Special Economic zone of the Russian Far East, thus they paid income tax in the following proportion: 2% to the federal budget and 16% to the regional budgets.

In Kazakhstan and Armenia income taxes are set at 20% and there are no regional or local income taxes in these countries.

Mining tax

Mining tax is a royalty payable in Russian Federation, Kazakhstan and Armenia, which is calculated based on the value of the precious metals extracted in the period. This value is usually determined based on the realised selling price of precious metals or, in case if there were no sales during the period, cost of production of metals extracted (Russian Federation) or the average market price (Kazakhstan) during the period. Royalty payable in Armenia is calculated as a percentage of actual sales during the reporting period.

Mining tax is Russia is levied at federal level, and then is reallocated between federal and respective regional budgets based on the following proportion: 40% of total tax collected to the federal budget, 60% to regional budgets. Mining tax and royalties in Kazakhstan and Armenia are levied at republican level.

Licence fees

These are fees and other sums paid as consideration for acquiring a licence for gaining access to an area where extractive activities are performed. Administrative government fees that are not specifically related to the extractive sector, or to access to extractive resources, are excluded. No significant licence fees individually more than 86,000 GBP were paid during the year ended 31 December 2016.

Rental fees

The land in the Russian Federation and Kazakhstan on which the Group's production facilities are located is owned by the state. The Group leases this land through operating lease agreements.

Other payments

Other payments include payments made and social commitments in accordance with subsoil contracts attributable to the Kyzyl project.

Cash and in-kind payments

Payments are reported on cash basis. No in-kind payments were made during years ended 31 December 2016 and 31 December 2015.

Materiality Level

Any payment, whether made as a single payment or as a series of related payments, below GBP 86,000 within a financial year is excluded from this Report.

Payments made to a governments by a joint ventures or associates of the Group in proportion to the company's interest in the respective venture or associate are insignificant to this Report based on materiality level set.

Exchange Rate

Relevant payments are made by Polymetal in Russian Rubles, Kazakh Tenge and Armenian Dram and for the purpose of this Report are translated to the US Dollar based on the foreign exchange rate at the relevant monthly average rate.

PAYMENTS PER GOVERNMENT FOR THE YEAR 2016
Government                    000'$						Income tax		Mining tax	Rental fees		Licence fees		Other		Total
Russia						133,114		76,503	1,231		18		443		211,309
Kazakhstan						5,324		4,501	49		-		1,522		11,395
Armenia						-		3,046	1		-		9		3,056
Total						138,438		84,050	1,281		18		1,973		225,760
PAYMENTS PER PROJECT FOR THE YEAR 2016
Entity                               000'$	Project		Country/ Government		Region	Income tax		Mining tax	Rental fees		Licence fees		Other		Total
JSC Gold of Northern Urals	Voro		Russia		Svedlovskaya oblast'	21,983		11,023	7		0		53		33,066
LLC Okhotskaya Mining and Exploration Company	Okhotsk		Russia		Khabarovskiy Kray	13,056		8,206	143		8		20		21,433
JSC Magadan Silver	Dukat		Russia		Magadanskaya oblast'	66,728		22,690	435				206		90,058
Mayskoye Gold Mining Company LLC	Mayskoye		Russia		Chukotka Autonomous Okrug	-		7,459	1		-		16		7,476
Omolon Gold Mining Company LLC	Omolon		Russia		Magadanskaya oblast'	12,838		9,100	338		10		32		22,318
Albazino Resources Ltd	Albazino		Russia		Khabarovskiy Kray	18,509		18,025	307		-		117		36,958
JSC Varvarinskoye	Varvara		Kazakhstan		n/a	4,271		4,501	11		-		612		9,396
JSC Komarovskoye Mining Company	Komar		Kazakhstan		n/a	905		-	-		-		87		992
Bakyrchik Mining Venture LLP	Kyzyl		Kazakhstan		n/a	147		-	34		-		799		979
JSC Inter Gold Capital	Kyzyl		Kazakhstan		n/a	-		-	4		-		25		28
Kapan MPC CJSC	Kapan		Armenia		n/a	-		3,046	1				9		3,056
Total						138,438		84,050	1,281		18		1,973		225,760
PAYMENTS PER GOVERNMENT FOR THE YEAR 2015
Government                    000'$						Income tax		Mining tax	Rental fees		Licence fees		Other		Total
Russia						114,285		90,340	1,105		3,609		-		209,339
Kazakhstan						3,309		1,093	107		-		231		4,740
Total						117,594		91,433	1,212		3,609		231		214,079
PAYMENTS PER PROJECT FOR THE YEAR 2015
Entity                               000'$	Project		Country/ Government		Region	Income tax		Mining tax	Rental fees		Licence fees		Other		Total
JSC Gold of Northern Urals	Voro		Russia		Svedlovskaya oblast'	25,648		9,996	-		37		-		35,681
LLC Okhotskaya Mining and Exploration Company	Okhotsk		Russia		Khabarovskiy Kray	4,552		7,638	174		425		-		12,789
JSC Magadan Silver	Dukat		Russia		Magadanskaya oblast'	52,896		32,236	438		2		-		85,572
Mayskoye Gold Mining Company LLC	Mayskoye		Russia		Chukotka Autonomous Okrug	-		10,668	-		-		-		10,668
Omolon Gold Mining Company LLC	Omolon		Russia		Magadanskaya oblast'	18,250		13,304	300		3,058		-		34,912
Albazino Resources Ltd	Albazino		Russia		Khabarovskiy Kray	12,939		16,498	193		87		-		29,717
JSC Varvarinskoye	Varvara		Kazakhstan		n/a	3,232		1,092	21				-		4,345
Bakyrchik Mining Venture LLP	Kyzyl		Kazakhstan		n/a	77		1	74				203		355
JSC Inter Gold Capital	Kyzyl		Kazakhstan		n/a	-		-	12		-		27		40
Total						117,594		91,433	1,212		3,609		230		214,078
Licence fees are attributable to the following licences:
Licence				Country/ Government			Fee 000'$
Irbychan				Russia			2,698
Tumaninskaya				Russia			133
Nizhniy Birkachan				Russia			108
Khotorchan				Russia			366
Other1				Russia			304
Total							3,609

______________________

¹ Individually less than GBP 86,000

Enquiries

Media		Investor Relations
FTI Consulting Leonid Fink Jenny Payne	[phone]	Polymetal Evgenia Onuschenko Maryana Nesis Michael Vasiliev	[e-mail] [phone] (UK) [phone] (Russia)
Joint Corporate Brokers
Morgan Stanley Sam McLennan Richard Brown Panmure Gordon Adam James Tom Salvesen	[phone] [phone]	RBC Europe Limited Tristan Lovegrove Marcus Jackson	[phone]

FORWARD-LOOKING STATEMENTS

THIS RELEASE MAY INCLUDE STATEMENTS THAT ARE, OR MAY BE DEEMED TO BE, "FORWARD-LOOKING STATEMENTS". THESE FORWARD-LOOKING STATEMENTS SPEAK ONLY AS AT THE DATE OF THIS RELEASE. THESE FORWARD-LOOKING STATEMENTS CAN BE IDENTIFIED BY THE USE OF FORWARD-LOOKING TERMINOLOGY, INCLUDING THE WORDS "TARGETS", "BELIEVES", "EXPECTS", "AIMS", "INTENDS", "WILL", "MAY", "ANTICIPATES", "WOULD", "COULD" OR "SHOULD" OR SIMILAR EXPRESSIONS OR, IN EACH CASE THEIR NEGATIVE OR OTHER VARIATIONS OR BY DISCUSSION OF STRATEGIES, PLANS, OBJECTIVES, GOALS, FUTURE EVENTS OR INTENTIONS. THESE FORWARD-LOOKING STATEMENTS ALL INCLUDE MATTERS THAT ARE NOT HISTORICAL FACTS. BY THEIR NATURE, SUCH FORWARD-LOOKING STATEMENTS INVOLVE KNOWN AND UNKNOWN RISKS, UNCERTAINTIES AND OTHER IMPORTANT FACTORS BEYOND THE COMPANY'S CONTROL THAT COULD CAUSE THE ACTUAL RESULTS, PERFORMANCE OR ACHIEVEMENTS OF THE COMPANY TO BE MATERIALLY DIFFERENT FROM FUTURE RESULTS, PERFORMANCE OR ACHIEVEMENTS EXPRESSED OR IMPLIED BY SUCH FORWARD-LOOKING STATEMENTS. SUCH FORWARD-LOOKING STATEMENTS ARE BASED ON NUMEROUS ASSUMPTIONS REGARDING THE COMPANY'S PRESENT AND FUTURE BUSINESS STRATEGIES AND THE ENVIRONMENT IN WHICH THE COMPANY WILL OPERATE IN THE FUTURE. FORWARD-LOOKING STATEMENTS ARE NOT GUARANTEES OF FUTURE PERFORMANCE. THERE ARE MANY FACTORS THAT COULD CAUSE THE COMPANY'S ACTUAL RESULTS, PERFORMANCE OR ACHIEVEMENTS TO DIFFER MATERIALLY FROM THOSE EXPRESSED IN SUCH FORWARD-LOOKING STATEMENTS. THE COMPANY EXPRESSLY DISCLAIMS ANY OBLIGATION OR UNDERTAKING TO DISSEMINATE ANY UPDATES OR REVISIONS TO ANY FORWARD-LOOKING STATEMENTS CONTAINED HEREIN TO REFLECT ANY CHANGE IN THE COMPANY'S EXPECTATIONS WITH REGARD THERETO OR ANY CHANGE IN EVENTS, CONDITIONS OR CIRCUMSTANCES ON WHICH ANY SUCH STATEMENTS ARE BASED.

 

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