Ukraine public debt changes little in 1H12

Ukraine’s public debt was down 0.4% mom in June and increased a mere 1.4% in 1H12 (to USD 60.0 bln), according to the Finance Ministry report from yesterday. The structure of the public debt was rebalanced – the share of external obligations fell 5.8 pp to 57.5% as new borrowings from the external market stood at just USD 1.0 bln (a portion of the USD 2.0 VTB loan that was refinanced) in 1H12.

Vitaliy Vavryshchuk: July’s stats will show a ~3% mom increase in public debt following the recent sale of USD 2.0 bln in Eurobonds. Overall, we project Ukraine’s public debt will increase 8% yoy in 2012 but decline in relation to GDP from 36% in 2011 to 34%, a reasonable amount by any standards.