Dynamics of exchange rate of hryvnia to U.S. Dollar in 2022-2023
Source: Open4Business.com.ua and experts.news
The Verkhovna Rada on Thursday supported in the second reading and in general the bill No. 9346-1 with amendments to the Budget Code of Ukraine on ensuring predictability of budget policy and strengthening debt sustainability, the head of the budget committee of the parliament Roksolana Pidlasa said.
According to her, the adoption of the law ahead of schedule means the implementation of a new structural beacon (#10) under the EFF Extended Fund Facility Program with the International Monetary Fund, as well as the launch of the implementation of beacon #12 – revision of the Medium-Term Debt Management Strategy with a deadline for its publication by the end of September this year.
Pidlasa specified that the adopted law prescribes to submit to each draft law on amendments to the state budget an expert opinion of the Ministry of Finance and to consider such draft laws in the Rada if there are conclusions of the Ministry of Finance on their support.
In addition, it restores more stringent conditions for amending the law on the state budget, as defined by Article 52 of the Budget Code, leaving the exception in the conditions of martial law revision of expenditures of the security and defense sector, the MP said.
Another norm of the adopted law is the restoration of the medium-term budget planning by drawing up the Budget Declaration from January 1, 2024, which was stopped last March due to the full-scale invasion of the Russian Federation, Pidlasa pointed out.
She added that the law limits in 2023-2028 the volume of state guarantees provided by decisions of the Cabinet of Ministers to 3% of the planned revenues of the general fund of the state budget, while the limit of state guarantees provided on the basis of international treaties will be determined by the law on the state budget.
Finally, the document instructs to resume this year the development of the Strategy of State Debt Management for 2024-2026, also halted due to the full-scale invasion, providing for its submission by the Ministry of Finance to the Government for consideration by October 25, 2023 and approval by the Government within a month from the date of adoption of the law on the state budget for 2024.
The National Bank has raised its forecast for Ukraine’s international reserves at the end of this year to $38.3 billion from $34.5 billion in its April forecast.
According to the NBU’s updated estimates presented at a briefing on Thursday, Ukraine’s international reserves will reach $42.6 billion at the end of next year and $44.1 billion a year later, while in April the National Bank gave more modest estimates of $36.1 billion and $37.1 billion, respectively.
The NBU expects that this year the external financing of the state budget alone will amount to $42 bln, and next year it estimates such a need at $37 bln.
According to its forecasts, such a large-scale financial external support will fully cover the negative current account balance, which this year and next year the NBU estimates at $11 bln, $17.2 bln and $16.1 bln, respectively.
As reported earlier, due to a significant inflow of external financing, Ukraine’s international reserves rose by 4.5 percent in June to a record high of $39.00bn.
Natural fires in Greece on Thursday reached the outskirts of the capital, reports Associated Press.
As noted, in particular, the fire in the area of the capital’s suburb of Kifissia spread rapidly due to increased wind. However, several helicopters and fire brigades were deployed to extinguish this fire. It was eventually extinguished.
Meanwhile, in the central part of Greece, near the city of Volos, the spread of forest fires has not yet stopped. Because of them closed part of one of the busiest highways. The movement of rail transport is carried out with interruptions.
Firefighters in Rhodes are fighting the raging fires for the 10th day. New fires are also reported in the forests on the island of Euboea.
Greek Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis on Thursday said more action is needed to combat climate change.
“Climate change may be a reality, but it cannot be an excuse. Our country needs to take more measures to be prepared to mitigate, as much as possible, the effects of this reality, which we are already beginning to feel and which could have dramatic effects on many aspects of our economic and social life,” he said.
On average, 75% of residential complexes in Ukraine have resumed construction works, while 82% have resumed sales, according to statistics from LUN portal.
According to the research presented at the conference “Analytics of the Ukrainian Real Estate Market: First Half of 2023”, more and more developers are resuming construction. As of today, 75% of residential complexes have resumed work on construction sites, while at the end of last year this figure was 69%.
The leaders in the resumption of construction work are the western and central regions of Ukraine, where the number of active construction sites is 88-96%. At the same time, 62% of residential complexes in Kyiv resumed construction, and 68% in the region. Kharkiv (19%), Mykolaiv (35%), and Zaporizhzhia (32%) regions show low rates of construction resumption.
According to LUN, as of July 25, 82% of new buildings out of 1,772 projects that were sold before the full-scale invasion began were sold. This figure corresponds to the data from June and is the highest since February 24, 2022.
Sales are most active in the western regions of Ukraine: 98% of residential complexes are sold in Zakarpattia region, 97% in Ivano-Frankivsk region, and 94% in Lviv region. Cherkasy, Kirovohrad, Zhytomyr, and Vinnytsia regions also have high rates (over 90% of open sales). In Kyiv and the region, the figure is 79% and 80%, respectively.
The lowest number of residential complexes for sale is in Mykolaiv region (67%), Zaporizhzhia region (40%) and Kharkiv region (19%).
At the same time, some developers completed sales during the full-scale war. According to LUN, 218 residential complexes were sold in Ukraine, most of them in Lviv region (46), Kyiv and Kyiv region (20 and 25 respectively), as well as in Odesa (23), Ivano-Frankivsk (20) and Zakarpattia (14) regions.
PJSC Ukrhazvydobuvannya (Kiev) on July 27 announced a tender for compulsory civil liability insurance of owners of land vehicles (MTPL).
As reported in the electronic public procurement system ProZorro, the expected cost of purchasing services is UAH 4.424 million.
The deadline for submitting documents is July 4.
