Ukraine state debt declines 0.6% in August

Ukraine’s state and state-guaranteed debt declined
0.6% m/m to USD 81.9 bln in August, the Finance Ministry reported on Sept. 27.
State domestic debt declined 1.2% m/m to USD 31.9 bln, while state foreign debt
dropped 0.3% m/m to USD 39.8 bln. State-guaranteed debt stayed flat at USD 10.2
bln.

In UAH terms, overall state debt stayed flat at UAH
2,067 bln (58% of 2018 GDP).

Evgeniya Akhtyrko: State
domestic debt declined in August as the amount of redeemed local bonds exceeded
receipts from newly placed bonds. In particular, MinFin paid bondholders UAH
12.6 bln and USD 123.5 mln. Meanwhile, receipts from new placements amounted to
UAH 7.5 bln.

The state repayments on the loans from the commercial
foreign banks, European Union, the European Investment Bank, and the IMF
resulted in decline of state foreign debt.

We project state and state-guaranteed debt will reach
USD 80.8 bln in 2019, or around 53% of GDP (vs. USD 78.3 bln, or 61% of GDP, in
2018).