Moldova Steel Works (; ) is a steel-producing company in

Rîbnița Rîbnița ( or , , ) or Rybnitsa (; ) is a town in the breakaway state, breakaway Moldovan region of Transnistria. According to the 2004 Census in Transnistria, 2004 census, it has a population of 53,648. Rîbnița is situated in the northern half ...

, in the unrecognized state of

Transnistria Transnistria, officially known as the Pridnestrovian Moldavian Republic and locally as Pridnestrovie, is a Landlocked country, landlocked Transnistria conflict#International recognition of Transnistria, breakaway state internationally recogn ...

. It accounts for more than half of Transnistrian total industrial output. Moldova Steel Works was founded in 1985 for reprocessing of

scrap metal Scrap consists of recyclable materials, usually metals, left over from product manufacturing and consumption, such as parts of vehicles, building supplies, and surplus materials. Unlike waste, scrap can have monetary value, especially recover ...

. In 1998, majority of its shares was sold to

Russia Russia, or the Russian Federation, is a country spanning Eastern Europe and North Asia. It is the list of countries and dependencies by area, largest country in the world, and extends across Time in Russia, eleven time zones, sharing Borders ...

n energy company Itera and 28.8% of shares was given to the employees of the company. Production peaked in 2000. In 2004, 90% of shares was acquired by "Austro-Ukrainian Hares Group" of Hares Youssef. Moldova Steel Works became owned by group of

Russian Russian(s) may refer to: *Russians (), an ethnic group of the East Slavic peoples, primarily living in Russia and neighboring countries *A citizen of Russia *Russian language, the most widely spoken of the Slavic languages *''The Russians'', a b ...

– Ukrainian oligarchs, including in addition to Hares Youssef also Hryhoriy Surkis, Ihor Kolomoyskyi,

Alisher Usmanov Alisher Burkhanovich Usmanov (, ; born 9 September 1953) is a Russian-Uzbek oligarch. He is sanctioned by the US, EU, UK, and Ukrainian governments. By March 2025, Usmanov had an estimated net worth of $16.7 billion and was ranked number 124 a ...

, Vadym Novynskyi and Rinat Akhmetov. Later the Russian company Metalloinvest, controlled by

and Vasily Anisimov, became owner of the company. In 2015, the ownership was returned to the Transnistrian authorities for a symbolic price. On 14 May 2018, the government of Ukraine included Moldova Steel Works in the list of sanctioned companies, but excluded it from the list on 19 March 2019 after a request by Moldovan Prime Minister

Pavel Filip Pavel Filip (born 10 April 1966) is a Moldova, Moldovan politician. In 2001–2008 he was the director of the Joint-stock company "Bucuria" and in 2008–2011, general manager of Tutun-CTC joint stock company. He was then Ministry of Informatio ...

. The initial annual production capacity of the company was 684,000 tonnes of crude steel and 500,000 tonnes of rolled products. Later the capacity was reported to be is around 1,000,000 tonnes of steel and 1,000,000 tonnes of rolled products. In 2018, it produced almost 502,900 tonnes of steel and 497,900 tonnes of rolled goods.

References

External links

* Companies of Transnistria Steel companies of Moldova Iron and steel mills Rîbnița Moldavian Soviet Socialist Republic 1985 establishments in the Soviet Union {{transnistria-stub