By KYIV. Sept 19 (Interfax-Ukraine) – The volume of Ukraine’s gross external debt during the second quarter of this year increased by $8.8 billion and at the end of the six months amounted to $148.6 billion, according to the website of the National Bank of Ukraine (NBU).
“Relative to GDP, debt increased from 90.5% to 92.7%,” the central bank said.
At the same time, the external debt of the public sector in the second quarter of 2023 increased by $8.4 billion to $84.5 billion (52.7% of GDP), while the debt of the private sector increased by $0.4 billion to $64.1 billion (40% GDP).
As the National Bank said, in the public sector the growth occurred due to the net attraction of loans from international partners in the amount of $8.8 billion, of which $3.6 billion from the International Monetary Fund (IMF), while the government’s debt on securities fell by $0.12 billion.
According to the central bank, the volume of external liabilities of Ukrainian banks decreased by $0.08 billion to $1.8 billion (1.1% of GDP), mainly due to a reduction in loan debt by a similar amount.
External debt of other sectors of the economy grew by $0.2 billion to $41.3 billion (25.8% of GDP). As the regulator explained, this is due to an increase in external debt on guaranteed loans – by $0.14 billion and securities – by $0.05 billion.
The debt of other economic sectors, taking into account intercompany debt, during the reporting quarter grew by $0.52 billion, to $62.3 billion (38.9% of GDP).
The direct intercompany debt of enterprises in direct investment relationships rose by $0.28 billion during the quarter to $21 billion (13.1% of GDP) due to an increase in external debt on credits and borrowings from a direct investor by $0.26 billion.
The NBU estimated the increase in private sector debt due to exchange rate changes at $0.4 billion.
The volume of overdue debt of the real sector on non-guaranteed loans (including from direct investors) increased in April-June by $0.13 billion and at the end of the second quarter amounted to $25.4 billion (15.9% of GDP). According to the NBU, the share of Cyprus in it is 58.1%. In addition, the shares of the United Kingdom grew by 1 percentage point (pp), to 9.2%, and the Netherlands, by 3 pp, to 5.8%.
According to the National Bank, at the end of the second quarter Cyprus remained the main creditor country in terms of the geographical structure of private sector debt on non-guaranteed loans (together with intercompany debt) – 49.2% of the total volume, its share since the beginning of the year has increased by 0.4 pp.
The shares of the Netherlands, Germany and Switzerland grew by 0.1 percentage points and amounted to 7.3%, 3.0% and 2.6%, respectively, while the United States’ share remained at 3.0%, and the shares of the UK and Luxembourg fell by 0.1 pp, to 10.7%.
The main currency of Ukraine’s external borrowings at the end of the second quarter of 2023 remained the U.S. dollar – 50% of the total external debt, but its share decreased by 3 percentage points over the quarter. At the same time, the share of borrowings in euros increased – from 31.9% to 33.8%, as well as in SDRs to the IMF – from 9.9% to 11.4%, while the share of external debt in hryvnias fell by 0.2 pp, to 1.6%.
The volume of short-term external debt by remaining maturity for the second quarter of 2023 increased by $1.2 billion and as of June 30, 2023 amounted to $40.8 billion.
At the same time, general government sector liabilities that require repayment over the next 12 months increased by $0.9 billion to $3.8 billion due to an increase in future government loan payments, including $0.2 billion to the IMF, while repayments central bank payments decreased by $0.18 billion to $1.3 billion due to smaller payments to the IMF.
The volume of short-term liabilities of the banking sector remained almost at the level of the previous quarter and amounted to $1.3 billion.
The total volume of borrowings from the real sector (together with intercompany debt), which shall be repaid over the next 12 months, increased by $0.5 billion and amounted to $34.4 billion as of June 30, 2023. The National Bank said that the growth is due to an increase in the volume of future repayments debt securities worth $0.4 billion.
