In January 2025, the volume of foreign currency purchases by the Ukrainian population exceeded the volume of its sales by $1 billion 479.8 million, which is 34.1% higher than in January 2024 and 13.6% higher than in December 2024 and is the highest figure since December 2012.
According to the NBU’s website, compared to December, cash currency sales decreased by $157.1 million, while purchases decreased by only $63.4 million to $2 billion 430.9 million, resulting in an increase in the negative balance to $1 billion 290.3 million.
In addition, in January of this year, the sale of non-cash foreign currency decreased by $69.1 million, while its purchase increased by $14 million to $460 million, which led to an increase in the negative balance to $189 million.
At the same time, it is worth noting that in the first half of January, when the hryvnia was weakening, the volume of purchases was higher, and by the end of the month, after the national currency strengthened, the daily negative balance was reduced, and only on the last day of the month and in early February was a significant increase in demand recorded again.
In the legal entities market, after a jump in purchases of foreign currency by bank clients in December to $8.41 billion from $6.22 billion in November, in January, purchases decreased to $5.56 billion, which is only 10% higher than in January last year.
At the same time, the sale of foreign currency by bank clients also fell significantly in January this year, to $3.78 billion from $4.96 billion in December, which is 10% less than in January last year.
As for the volume of transactions between banks, it also decreased compared to December – from a record high of $7.96 billion since the beginning of the war to $6.12 billion. However, this figure is 40.8% better than in January 2024.
As reported, the official hryvnia exchange rate in the first half of January fell from 42.0295 UAH/$1 to a new all-time low of 42.2841 UAH/$1, but in the second half of the month it strengthened to 41.8242 UAH/$1.
The National Bank’s net sale of foreign currency on the interbank market in January decreased to $3.75 billion from a record high of $5.28 billion in December, although this is significantly higher than the January-2024 figure of $2.53 billion.
In total, the volume of foreign currency purchases by the Ukrainian population in 2024 exceeded the volume of its sales by $12.22 billion, which is 2.5 times or $7.43 billion more than in 2023, but thanks to large-scale foreign aid, international reserves increased to $43.8 billion last year.
In 2024, the official hryvnia exchange rate against the US dollar weakened by 10.6%, or UAH 4.02, including 0.9%, or 37 kopecks, in December.
