Director of Ukraine's State Bureau of Investigations (SBI) Roman Truba has said the amount of losses from illegal schemes using government domestic loan bonds could amount to tens of millions of U.S. dollars.

"At present, we have information about embezzlement and abuse during the sale and purchase of government bonds. According to preliminary data, the amount of losses amounts to tens of millions of dollars, and members of parliament of Ukraine are also involved in this scheme," Truba said at a meeting of the National Anti-corruption Council chaired by Ukraine's President Volodymyr Zelensky in Kyiv on Thursday.

Truba said criminal proceedings are in the initial stage.

"I promise that in the near future society and specialists will hear about our results in these matters," he added.

As reported, in October 2018, Ukraine's SBU State Security Service searches at the offices of several professional participants in the stock market and at the residences of officials. An investigator from the SBU reported that top managers of Ukrgasbank, Alfa-Bank and Bank Alliance in collusion with managers of the PFTS Stock Exchange, Ukrainian Exchange, Univer Capital, Univer Management asset management company, I-Invest LLC, PrJSC Master Brok, Navigator-Invest LLC, PrJSC Art Capital investment and financial company (all based in Kyiv), as well as Cypriot companies Opexier and Greencliff Enterprises Limited and individuals carried out transactions on the sale and purchase of government domestic loan bonds in the joint report mode to hide over UAH 86 million in illegally earned money.

The National Bank of Ukraine (NBU) in early March 2019 said public officials and people close to them were involved in schemes to gain investment profits by artificially generating income for its further legalization during the declaration of assets. The regulator indicated that it is the so-called "cyclic operations" when the same government bonds are bought and sold within a short period of time, including one working day.

The NBU recommended that banks pay special attention to monitoring such financial transactions, including government bonds denominated in foreign currency, the nature of which may indicate money laundering attempts.