By KYIV. Nov 7 (Interfax-Ukraine) – Ukraine’s international reserves in October decreased by 1.9%, or $735.2 million, and as of November 1, 2023, according to preliminary data, amounted to $38.973 billion, the National Bank of Ukraine (NBU) reported.
“This dynamics was due to the NBU’s interventions and the country’s debt payments in foreign currency. At the same time, both factors were largely offset by receipts from international partners,” the central bank indicated.
He clarified that last month it sold $3.352 billion on the foreign exchange market and bought back $14 million for reserves, therefore the net sale of foreign currency amounted to $3.338 billion compared to $2.691 billion in September.
“The growth of interventions was primarily due to a situational increase in demand for currency in the first days of the transition from exchange rate fixing to a regime of managed exchange rate flexibility,” the NBU said.
It added that in the first week of the transition, net sales amounted to $1.152 billion, and subsequently, interventions on the sale of currency stabilized to the level observed at the time of the transition to managed exchange rate flexibility.
According to the National Bank, the government’s foreign currency accounts in the National Bank received $3.313 billion, including $1.590 billion macro-financial assistance from the EU, $1.15 billion – a US grant through the World Bank Donor Trust Fund and $572.7 million – from the placement of foreign currency domestic government loan bonds.
Revaluation of the value of financial instruments increased reserves in October by $247.2 million, the National Bank indicated.
At the same time, the regulator noted, the Ukrainian government paid $892.5 million for servicing and repaying the public debt in foreign currency, of which $715.3 million was for foreign currency government bonds, $135.8 million to the World Bank and $80.1 million to the IMF.
“The current volume of international reserves provides financing for 5.2 months of future imports,” the report notes, while a month ago this figure was 5.3 months.
At the end of October, the NBU raised its forecast for international reserves at the end of this year to $41.8 billion from $38.3 billion in the July forecast.
