Ukraine's international reserves shrink by 9.2% in Sept

Ukraine's international reserves shrank by 9.2% in September 2021, to $28.7 billion, due to peak payments on external debt liabilities, the press service of the National Bank of Ukraine (NBU) has reported.

In general, the dynamics of reserves during September was determined by the following factors. The first one is public debt management operations. Government payments on servicing and repaying public debt in foreign currency amounted to $2.557 billion. In particular, $2.521 billion was allocated for servicing and repaying foreign government bonds and $2.1 million was spent on servicing domestic government bonds. Foreign exchange earnings in favor of the government from the placement of domestic government bonds amounted to $216.9 million. The second factor is the revaluation of financial instruments (due to changes in market value and exchange rates). Their value last year decreased by $202 million dollars. The third factor is NBU transactions in the interbank foreign exchange market. In September, the supply of foreign currency in the interbank foreign exchange market mostly exceeded demand. This allowed the NBU to buy back $146.6 million into the reserves.

In total, in September 2021, the NBU's net purchase of foreign currency on the foreign exchange market amounted to $139.6 million.

Ukraine's international reserves increased to $31.6 billion in August 2021, reaching a nine-year high.

op