Ukraine should try to get tranche from IMF under SBA by late 2020 – Deputy NBU governor
The opportunity to receive two tranches under the Stand-By Arrangement (SBA) from the International Monetary Fund (IMF) by the end of this year has already been lost, and Ukraine must try to get one, realizing that it will be tied to the adoption of the state budget for 2021, Deputy Governor of the NBU Dmytro Sologub has said.
"What we can now focus on and try to do is to receive the IMF tranche by the end of the year... Most likely, as in 2018, it will be tied to the adoption of the budget. We are speaking about November," he said in an exclusive interview with Interfax-Ukraine.
Sologub also said that the National Bank proposed to the government to shape the draft state budget 2021 based on a more conservative forecast than, in particular, inflation of 7.3% and the average annual rate of UAH 29.10/$1. The deputy governor of the NBU added that the 6% GDP deficit laid down by the Cabinet of Ministers contradicts the countercyclical principle laid down in the program with the IMF, and raises doubts about the possibility of financing it.
He also recalled that the rest of the programs of international assistance to Ukraine are tied to the IMF program.
According to him, the delay in international funding is associated with the replacement of the governor of the NBU, Yakiv Smolii, who resigned due to political pressure, early July.
"The National Bank has actually returned to the situation in 2015, in which it already was, when a trust loan from the IMF needs to be acquired practically from scratch. And, as practice shows, this takes from some six to nine months. And moreover, during these six-nine months there should be a clean track record," Sologub said.