The International Monetary Fund’s board of directors voted yesterday to allocate USD 250 bln on August 28 and USD 33 bln on September 9 to member nations to support foreign exchange reserves. About USD 100 bln of the first allocation is to be directed to emerging and developing countries, including SDR 1,071.1 mln to Ukraine, the equivalent of USD 1,585 mln to bolster the National Bank of Ukraine’s currency reserves. Andrii Parkhomenko: The first allocation will increase the NBU’s reserves by 5% (if we use July’s number of USD 29.6 bln). It is unclear how much of the second USD 33 bln allocation Ukraine will receive, but based on the allocation ratios for the USD 250 bln, we believe it will be about USD 150-200 mln. Notably, in order for the NBU to make use of the funds for currency interventions, it will first have to exchange the SDRs into US dollars.