ICU Investment Group forecasts a slowdown in Ukraine’s real GDP growth in 2026 to 1.2% from 2.1% in 2025, while in July the company forecast GDP growth of 2.5% this year and 2.8% next year.
“Macroeconomic risks are under control, but economic recovery is slow,” according to ICU’s updated macroeconomic forecast released on Tuesday.
ICU noted that the European Union’s (EU) decision to grant Ukraine a loan should provide the preconditions for macroeconomic stability, financing the budget deficit, and supporting the National Bank’s reserves in 2026-2027, as well as creating the basis for the implementation of a new cooperation program with the International Monetary Fund for at least the next two years.
At the same time, according to the investment group, Ukraine will need additional bilateral loans and grants to fully cover its defense needs.
ICU expects economic growth to slow down primarily due to damage to energy and transport infrastructure from Russian attacks, electricity shortages, and complications with maritime exports, which will cause temporary downtime for large manufacturers.
Additional restraining factors include a gradual reduction in the state budget deficit and fiscal stimulus, as well as business hesitation to invest due to high security risks. Private consumption will remain the key driver of growth.
According to ICU’s forecast, annual inflation at the end of 2026 will be 6-7%, and the National Bank of Ukraine will move to ease monetary policy at the end of January with a cumulative reduction in the discount rate by 200 basis points during the year to 13.5%.
According to the company, the National Bank will slightly weaken the hryvnia in 2026 amid slowing inflation and growing external imbalances, and forecasts the hryvnia-dollar exchange rate at the end of next year at UAH 44.3/$1, which is slightly better than the July forecast of UAH 44.9/$1. Reserves, according to the investment group’s estimates, will remain at record levels thanks to EU funding.
According to ICU estimates, at the end of 2025, inflation will be 8.3%, the hryvnia exchange rate will be 42.4 UAH/USD, international reserves will be $53.1 billion, the current account deficit will be 18.2% of GDP, the budget deficit (before official grants) will be 22% of GDP, and public debt will be 101% of GDP.
For 2026, the company forecasts inflation at 6.3%, international reserves at $52.3 billion, a current account deficit of 16.8% of GDP, a budget deficit of 19% of GDP, and public debt of 109% of GDP.As reported, at the end of October, the National Bank downgraded its forecast for the country’s economic growth in 2025 from 2.1% to 1.9% due to energy shortages, the destruction of gas production facilities, and labor shortages, and for 2026 from 2.3% to 2%.
Assets of non-state pension funds (NPFs) under the management of ICU Investment Group grew by 20.4% to UAH 1.07 billion in 2024, while the total increase in assets of the entire non-state pension system of the country amounted to 17.3% to UAH 5.72 billion, the group said in a press release on Friday.
“Despite the wartime challenges, the stable operation of NPFs and the growing need for long-term motivational tools for employees have attracted the attention of employers to corporate pension programs,” it quotes Grigory Ovcharenko, director of asset management at ICU Group in Ukraine, as saying.
It is noted that excluding the NPF of the National Bank of Ukraine, the share of assets of the investment group in the context of the entire non-state pension system amounted to 32.1% at the end of this year.
The company reminded that ICU manages the assets of six NPFs: NCPF “Ukreximbank” (NAV as of February – UAH 413.5 million), VNPF “Emerit-Ukraine”, NPF “Dynasty”, NPF “Priчастность”, NPF “Mutual Aid”, NPF “Turbota”.
According to the release, NPF “Turbota” at the end of 2024 increased the amount of contributions by 84.8% (net asset value, NAV as of February was UAH 2.55 million), NPF “Dynasty” – by 42.8% (NAV of UAH 292.4 million) and NPF “Mutual Aid” – by 33% (NAV of UAH 10.6 million).
The leaders of ICU NPFs in terms of net profitability according to the results of 2024 were: NPF “Dynasty” (+19.8%), NPF “Mutual Aid” and ONPF “Emerit-Ukraine” (+18.3%, NAV 328.8 million UAH), which took the fourth, fifth and sixth positions among all NPFs in the country.
“All these funds outperformed inflation, devaluation and yields on hryvnia-denominated government bonds and deposits,” the company notes in the release.
According to ICU information, the number of clients in funds managed by the group increased by 4.4% over the year – to more than 124 thousand people.
ICU Group is an independent financial group providing brokerage, asset management and private equity services. The company is also engaged in venture capital and fintech investments. ICU’s geographic focus is on emerging markets around the world. It has more than $500 million in assets under management and a client investment portfolio of UAH 23.8 billion.
The group, according to its data, has been the largest broker of government bonds in Ukraine for more than 15 years.
The co-owners of ICU are Makar Pasenyuk and Konstantin Stetsenko.
Non-resident individuals will be able to buy Ukrainian government bonds with maturities from three months to three years on the online government bond trading platform ICU Trade, ICU Financial Group has announced.
“At present, non-residents can register remotely with a broker and buy and sell domestic government bonds in the same way as Ukrainian citizens do now,” the group said in a press release on Monday.
It is specified that residents of Russia and Belarus will be denied access to the service.
“The purchase and storage of securities is free of charge. Yields for non-residents will be the same as for domestic clients. There are no income taxes on government bonds in Ukraine,” the statement said.
The company clarified to Interfax-Ukraine that non-residents already have the opportunity to repatriate foreign currency funds invested in government bonds.
ICU recalled that numerous requests from foreign citizens to buy Ukrainian government bonds began to arrive after the launch of trading at the beginning of the full-scale invasion.
According to the company, at that time there was no such opportunity in Ukraine due to the lack of the regulatory framework and technical solutions necessary for these operations, which have been found today thanks to the joint work of market participants.
“We consider this project to be a volunteer project. It is costly and we do not make money on it, but we consider it fundamentally important to help the country. We are grateful to the NBU, the NSSMC, and the Ministry of Finance of Ukraine for their joint efforts, which made it possible to provide such services to foreign investors at the technological and regulatory level,” the company said in a press release.
According to the ICU, there is already a small queue of citizens of the United States, Israel, Poland, Germany, the United Kingdom, Australia, and Canada who want to buy Ukrainian bonds.
“These are both representatives of the diasporas and foreigners not connected with Ukraine who share the values of our country. We will work to increase the number of such investors in Ukraine,” emphasized Konstantin Stetsenko, co-founder of ICU Group.
The company noted that the registration of investors from some countries may take longer due to differences in the legal framework and the peculiarities of the work of mobile operators in different countries, and therefore asked to “treat such cases with understanding” and said that it would help each client to formalize everything properly.
ICU Group is an independent financial group that provides brokerage, asset management and private equity services. The group is also engaged in venture capital and fintech investments. ICU focuses on emerging markets around the world. The group manages assets of more than $500 million. According to the group, it has been the largest broker of government bonds in Ukraine for more than 15 years.
ICU is co-owned by Makar Paseniuk and Konstantin Stetsenko.
According to the NBU, as of September 18, non-resident legal entities held UAH 47.85 billion worth of government bonds, while resident individuals held UAH 46.14 billion, with a total volume of government bonds in circulation of UAH 1 trillion 266.65 billion.
The National Securities and Stock Market Commission has admitted green bonds of NPC Ukrenergo (ISIN 2404309754) to circulation in Ukraine, the press service of the regulator said on Friday.
According to the data on the website of the National Securities and Stock Market Commission, the ICU investment group initiated the entry of the securities; the placement will take place on the Perspektiva stock exchange.
Thus, there are already 91 foreign securities admitted to trading in Ukraine.
As reported, on November 3, NPC Ukrenergo announced the successful placement of five-year eurobonds secured by government guarantees in the amount of $825 million (equivalent to UAH 21.69 billion) with a yield of 6.875%. The order book was almost three times oversubscribed.
The placement was organized by BNP Paribas, Deutsche Bank, Goldman Sachs and Ukreximbank, and Ukrenergo’s financial and sustainable development advisors were Rothschild & Cie with FinPoint and BNP Paribas, respectively.
The European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD) has invested $75 million in green bonds of Ukrenergo.
Ukrenergo operates trunk and interstate power transmission lines, as well as centralized dispatching of the country’s Integrated Power System.
ICU Investment Group has taken over the management of the Turbota open non-state pension fund and is positioning it as a 100% foreign currency pension fund, the investment group’s press service said.
“Along with active growth of the number of participants in non-state pension programs, their interest in investing in foreign exchange assets is increasing. This is the strategy we are introducing for the first time on the Ukrainian non-state pension fund market,” Head of Local Asset Management at ICU Hryhoriy Ovcharenko said.
According to the press release, at the initiative of ICU, the composition of the independent supervisory board of the open non-state pension fund was renewed. It was headed by member of the supervisory board of Nova Poshta, former Board Chairman of Pravex Bank Taras Kyrychenko. Apart from Ovcharenko, the fund’s board also includes Board Chairman of the insurance company ARX Andriy Peretiazhko, representatives of the asset management company UpInvest – Head of the UpInvest regulatory requirements department Serhiy Kyrpychov and Head of the administration department Anna Tarasenko, as well as Head of the investment sales department of the asset management company ICU Maryna Petrenko.
The direct management company of the open non-state pension fund will be an asset management company belonging to ICU Group – the administrator of pension funds UpInvest.
Turbota open non-state pension fund began its work in 2009. The founders of the fund are AMC Art-Capital Management LLC and Investment Financial Company Art-Capital LLC.
According to the financial statements, the net asset value of Turbota at the end of September 2021 amounted to UAH 438,000, the volume of pension contributions for nine months – UAH 87,000, payments – UAH 75,000, investment loss – UAH 6,500, and the increase in the net unit value of pension assets – 4.9%.
According to the data on the official website UpInvest, almost 76,000 pension accounts are under its administration, and the total value of assets under management exceeds UAH 556 million. The company estimates its share of the NPF asset management market at 28%.
ICU Group is an independent financial group providing brokerage, asset management and private equity services. The group is also involved in venture capital investments. The geography of ICU interests is emerging markets around the world.
The National Securities and Stock Market Commission on September 15 registered the issue of investment certificates of the closed-end unit investment fund ICU Eurobond Fund with a seed capital of UAH 500 million.
The nominal value of one investment certificate is UAH 1,000. The volume of the issue is 500,000 certificates, the National Commission said.
ICU Investment Group, Founded in 2006 by senior investment professionals from ING, is an independent financial group providing brokerage, asset and private equity management services and specializing in the markets of Central and Eastern Europe. ICU currently manages over $500 million in assets. ICU is Ukraine’s leading asset manager.
The owners and partners of the group are Makar Paseniuk and Kostiantyn Stetsenko.
ICU, ICU INVESTMENT GROUP, NATIONAL SECURITIES, STOCK MARKET COMMISSION
