IMF program review mission to arrive Ukraine “later in September”

17 September 2021

A virtual IMF review mission in Ukraine is planned for September, and the date will be announced later, closer to the mission’s start, IMF spokesman Gerry Rice told a press briefing on Sept. 16. He repeated that the remaining issues for the review are: strengthening the governance and autonomy of the National Bank of Ukraine (NBU), judicial reform, restoring and strengthening the anti-corruption framework and the fiscal position. Rice refused to provide any timeline for the next IMF tranche under the program, nor probability for extension of the program, which terminates in December.

 

Recall, earlier this week, PM Denys Shmyhal stated that he expected the IMF mission would start next week and the next IMF tranche will arrive in Ukraine in late November or December. He also assured that Ukraine had implemented all the structural benchmarks under the program.

 

Alexander Paraschiy: It seems that the IMF mission has not been scheduled for the next week, otherwise there would already be information regarding scheduling. Among the outstanding issues listed by Rice, the easiest looks to be the question on fiscal issues: Ukraine’s 2022 budget has been drafted with an acceptable deficit of 3.5% of GDP. Progress with judicial and anti-corruption issues is yet to be reached. Also, it is not very clear what the NBU governance question stands for. As before, we remain a bit skeptical about the IMF's tranche in 2021, keeping its probability at no more than 50%.