International Reserves Up 3.1% To USD 25.7 Billion In April
In April, the international reserves rose by 3.1% to USD 25.695 billion as at May 1, 2020.
The NBU has said this in a statement, Ukrainian News Agency reports.
In general, the international reserves’ dynamics were defined by the following factors:
- transactions of the National Bank of Ukraine on the interbank foreign currency market;
- demand for foreign currency from businesses considerably decreased in April over March;
- foreign currency supply was more than enough to satisfy client claims, therefore, the hryvnia strengthened its position, and the NBU resumed transactions to expand the international reserves;
- net foreign currency buy by the NBU made USD 678.8 million in April;
- foreign currency procurement interventions were conducted randomly while the foreign currency supply was higher than the demand. The overall interventions amounted to USD 723.3 million.
At the same time, to smoothen excessive hryvnia fluctuations towards its devaluation, in April, the National Bank of Ukraine sold USD 44.5 million.
Besides, the central bank sent USD 303.9 million to servicing and redemption of the state and state-secured debt in foreign currency.
USD 128.6 million of the said amount was paid on government domestic loan bonds denominated in foreign currency; and extra USD 78 million on the eurobonds.
The current volume of the international reserves covers 4.5 months of upcoming import, which is enough to fulfill Ukraine’s obligations and current operations of the Government and the NBU.
As Ukrainian News Agency earlier reported, in 2019, the international reserves rose by 22% to USD 25.3 billion as at January 1, 2020.
In 2018, Ukraine’s international reserves rose by 10.6% to USD 20.8 billion as at January 1, 2019.