Thanks to growth of currency supply on the cash currency market net currency purchase by banks from the public has reached $1.6 billion since early 2016, Governor of the National Bank of Ukraine (NBU) Valeriya Gontareva said at a press conference in Kyiv on Thursday.

She said that the NBU over the period held 71 currency auctions and one currency intervention at the fixed exchange rate. Net currency purchase by the central bank in H1 2016 totaled $1.4 billion.

Gontareva also said that liberalization of administrative currency restrictions in June had manageable consequences and it has not resulted in destabilization of the currency market.

"The permit to repatriate dividends has not created an additional pressure on the currency market: the volume of currency bought for repatriation of dividends amounted to some $100 million, which was slightly lower than the declared [amount of dividends for repatriation] and its share of demand on the currency market was small," she said.

Demand on currency to pay dividends was compensated by the favorable situation on foreign markets.

Gontareva said that low demand on foreign currency is linked to the unwillingness of business to take funds from working capital. Attractive large deposit rates in the national currency also added to this.