Internal and external debt of Ukraine in 2009-2022
Source: Open4Business.com.ua and experts.news
State-owned Ukreximbank (Kiev) has put up for auction the claim for the unfinished Sky Towers complex in the center of Kiev at a starting price of UAH 5.580bn.
The auction will be held according to the Dutch model (with price reduction) on May 11 at OpenMarket (SE “SETAM” of the Ministry of Justice).
An attempt to sell the asset had previously been undertaken by the state bank in November 2021 with a starting price of UAH 7.145 billion.
The bank report emphasizes that this is an offer “for an ambitious investor, ready to put an end to the epic of one of the most famous construction projects in the city”, specifying that the 47-storey complex of 223 th sq.m. is completed only up to 28 floors.
It should include two towers of 47 and 34 floors, office and retail premises, 8-level underground parking lot for 900 cars built on the land plot of 0,74 ha located in Sholudenko Street which was also mortgaged by the bank.
It is noted that additional liquid security is the array of 60 land plots with a total area of more than 80 hectares, located within Zazimskiy rural council of Brovarskiy district of Kyiv region.
Also pledged to the bank were property rights for design-bidding and design-budget documentation for building of a community center, and a 100% share in the authorized capital of a debtor legal person.
The possibility of transferring to this facility of the capital mayor’s office was discussed in early 2018 by the Kiev Investment Agency, the completion was estimated at $370 million. At the start of the project was estimated at $512 million.
As reported, Sky Towers on Pobedy Avenue, 13 could become the first Ukrainian skyscraper higher than 200 m (projected height of 214 m). The construction was carried out up to 2015, but reached 28 floors with a design height of 47, after which it was stopped. According to the director of the development company “Agency of Office Construction” Alexander Demin, preservation of the object was not carried out.
Credit agreement with Ukreksimbank was concluded in 2007. In May 2012, the KDD Group, which has fallen into a difficult financial situation, signed an agreement to sell the American Cimbrorum Holdings LLC for $ 202.4 million project Sky Towers and the residential complex “Zazimye. Of this amount, KDD was to receive $12 mln in cash, while the rest was obligations, including $168.4 mln to Ukreximbank. At the same time, the bank increased the credit line for the completion of Sky Towers to $193 million, and the borrower was the Office Construction Agency.
In 2019, the parties signed a financial restructuring plan, but the developer continued to default. The Economic Court of Kyiv in early 2021 satisfied the claim of Ukreximbank to recover from the Agency of Office Construction 5.95 billion UAH of the debt on the loan to finance the construction of Sky Towers.
According to the Unified State Register of Legal Entities and Individual Entrepreneurs, the founder of the Office Construction Agency LLC with registered capital of UAH 442 million is the American Taccadero Trading Limited, with David Israel as the ultimate beneficiary.
Ukreximbank was founded in 1992, and the only owner is the state.
According to the National Bank of Ukraine, as of November 1, 2022 Ukreximbank in terms of total assets ranked third (267.423 billion UAH) among the 67 operating in the country.
On Friday, April 14, a large part of Ukraine will remain cloudy, sometimes with rain, according to the Ukrhydrometeocenter.
On the left bank and in Kyiv region at night, light rain is expected, in the eastern regions, in Transcarpathia and the Carpathians in the daytime moderate rains; in the rest of the territory without significant precipitation.
According to the Ukrhydrometeocenter, fog is expected in the western, southwestern and central regions at night and in the morning. The wind is predominantly northeasterly, 5-10 m/s.
The temperature at night will be 3-8°, daytime 10-15°, in the southern and western regions 13-18°, in Transcarpathia up to 22°; in the Carpathians at night from 2° warm to 3° frost, daytime 9-14° heat.
Friday, April 14, in Kiev, it is slightly raining at night, while during the day there are no significant precipitations. The wind is northeastern, 5-10 m/s. The temperature at night is 6-8°C, while during the day it is 11-13°C.
According to the Central Geophysical Observatory. The highest daytime temperature of April 14 in Kiev was 25.4°C in 1972, the lowest night-time temperature was -3.9°C in 1928.
On Saturday, April 15, at night in the eastern part of the country and the Carpathian region, and during the day on the Right Bank, rains are expected, sometimes with thunderstorms, and in some areas with hail; in the rest of the territory, without precipitation.
Winds are mostly south-east, 7-12 m/s. The temperature at night is 4-9° of heat, 10-15° during the day, in the south of the country in some places 16-21°; in the east and Sumy regions at night from 4°C to 1°C of frost, while during the day – 5-10° of heat.
In Kiev, Saturday, April 15, at night precipitation is not expected, while rain during the day, sometimes with a thunderstorm. The wind is mainly southeastern, 7-12 m/s. The temperature at night is 6-8° warm, while during the day it is 12-14°.
According to the materials of the Security Service of Ukraine (SBU), the property of former people’s deputy, subsanctioned businessman Vadym Novinsky worth more than 3.5 billion UAH has been arrested, the special service said.
“According to the materials of the Security Service arrested the property of pro-Russian oligarch Vadim Novinsky, involved in the complicity of the aggressor country,” the SBU said in a message in the Telegram channel on Thursday.
According to its data, the list of blocked assets includes corporate rights to 40 Ukrainian enterprises and 30 gas wells, where industrial volumes of “blue fuel” are produced. The total amount of property seized is more than 3.5 billion hryvnias.
Reportedly, in order to avoid sanctions of the National Security and Defence Council, Novinsky tried to re-register his own industrial facilities to several affiliated commercial structures. To implement the deal, he engaged controlled private notaries and state registrars.
Currently, based on the materials provided by the SBU, the Ministry of Justice of Ukraine has cancelled the illegal actions of the registrars for a number of the oligarch’s companies.
As part of criminal proceedings under Article 111-2 (aiding and abetting the aggressor state) the SBU officers searched the offices of the companies and the places of work and residence of those involved. During the searches, documents, seals of non-resident companies and pro-Kremlin religious literature were found.
An investigation is under way to establish all the circumstances of the crime and bring the perpetrators to justice, the SBU said.
Investigative actions are conducted under the procedural guidance of the Office of the Prosecutor General in cooperation with the Ministry of Justice of Ukraine.
As reported, the President of Ukraine Volodymyr Zelensky’s decree of December 1, 2022 put into effect the decision of the National Security and Defense Council “On certain aspects of the activities of religious organizations in Ukraine and the application of personal special economic and other restrictive measures (sanctions)”, which sanctions were also applied to Novinsky.
The sanctions package includes 12 types of imposed restrictions, in particular, a complete blocking of assets, a ban on trade transactions, deprivation of all state awards and insignia, a ban on the withdrawal of capital outside of Ukraine, etc.
Ukraine’s real gross domestic product fell by 29.1% in 2022 after growing 3.4% in 2021 due to full-scale Russian military aggression, the State Statistics Service said.
According to its data, Ukraine’s nominal GDP last year was markedly higher than most analysts’ forecasts and amounted to UAH 5.191 trillion.
Gosstat specified that the deflator change for 2022 as a whole amounted to 34.3%, including 36.5% in the fourth quarter, compared to 38.1% in the third quarter, 37.7% in the second quarter and 25.5% in the first quarter.
According to his data, Ukraine’s real GDP decreased by 31.4% in the fourth quarter of last year, 30.6% in the third quarter, 36.9% in the second quarter and 14.9% in the first quarter.
According to Oleksiy Blinov, head of the analytical department of Sense Bank, in dollar terms the nominal GDP for last year was about $159 billion.
For 2021, the nominal GDP of Ukraine, according to the State Statistics Committee, was equal to 5.451 trillion UAH, or more than $200 billion.
Part of the donor funds for Ukraine’s quick recovery is being channeled through the new Ukraine Recovery, Rehabilitation and Reforms Trust Fund (URTF) created by the World Bank late last year, whose size the bank intends to increase to $2 billion, WB Governor David Malpass said.
“We intend to increase this fund to $2 billion and to mobilize an additional $1 billion to $2 billion from private partners,” he said Wednesday at the third ministerial roundtable in support of Ukraine, which took place at the WB and IMF spring meeting in Washington.
Malpass specified that the mechanism was created to mobilize additional support from the International Finance Corporation (IFC) of the World Bank Group, which works with the private sector and has already allocated about $150 million to Ukraine’s private sector with support from donor partners across Europe.
“We have pledged to share risks with the IFC,” the WB chief noted.
He added that the Multilateral Investment Guarantee Agency (MIGA), part of the WB Group, would also help with this task and had already provided more than $116 million in guarantees for Ukraine since the war began.
“It is critical to support the country’s long-term growth through projects in sectors such as energy infrastructure, transportation, agriculture and human capital. Our investments will be accompanied by policy and reform advice and the structuring of viable projects that can mobilize private capital,” Malpass stressed.
As World Bank Regional Director for Eastern Europe Arup Banerjee told Interfax-Ukraine in late February of this year, $295 million had been accumulated in the URTF at the time.
