WASHINGTON: The executive board of International Monetary Fund on Thursday approved a third review of Ukraine’s $15.6 billion loan program, allowing the release of $880 million for budget support.
The IMF said Ukraine faces exceptionally high risks especially the uncertainties surrounding the war with Russia and prospects for foreign funding.
IMF’s Ukraine mission chief Gavin Gray told journalists that the war in Ukraine is likely to wind down by the end of 2024.
Gray said Ukraine’s overall performance regarding the IMF program had remained good in its first year and it had fulfilled almost all quantitative performance criteria. The miss is regarding the tax revenues, but with a very minor amount.
He added that Ukraine could receive the funds in coming days. This is a positive development for Ukraine as the US Congress continues to debate release for a $61 billion supplemental aid package for Ukraine.
Gray said the IMF would have to evaluate the impact on Ukraine’s debt levels if the US parliamentarians decided to convert some part of the grant to a loan.
Sanaa Nadeem, the IMF’s deputy mission chief for Ukraine, said the IMF had approved a new debt analysis for Ukraine that had not changed the macroeconomic analysis materially, but did exclude some $3 billion in debt for Russian bonds that had been opposed by the Ukrainian authorities.
She told reporters that reasonable progress was being made on restructuring of Ukraine’s commercial debt and the technical discussions on the are expected to pick up in coming weeks.
