In the first half of 2023, Ukraine’s total public debt increased by 15.6% to a new all-time high: by $17.4 billion to $128.81 billion in dollar terms, and by UAH 635.0 billion to UAH 4 trillion 710.4 billion in hryvnia terms, according to the website of the Ministry of Finance.
According to the data, the direct public debt increased by 17.8% to $119.68 billion, or UAH 4 trillion 376.48 billion, and accounted for 92.9% of the total public and publicly guaranteed debt.
It is reported that the external direct debt in the first half of the year increased by 25.6%, or $16.30 billion, to $79.89 billion, while the internal direct debt increased by only 4.7%, or UAH 65.3 billion, to UAH 1 trillion 454.95 billion (equivalent to $39.79 billion).
Ukraine’s total external public debt increased by 21.8%, or by $15.61 billion, to $87.08 billion in January-June 2023, while the total internal public debt increased by 4.4%, or by UAH 64.3 billion, to UAH 1 trillion 526.2 billion.
As a result, the share of total external debt increased from 64.1% to 67.6%.
It is specified that in June, the total public debt of Ukraine increased by 2.5%: by $3.20 billion or UAH 116.93 billion, including the total external debt by 3.7%, or $3.09 billion.
According to the Ministry of Finance, the share of liabilities in euros rose to 27.70% at the end of June, in Canadian dollars to 2.55%, and in SDRs to 13.17%, while the share in US dollars fell to 26.44%, in hryvnia to 29.41%, in yen to 0.72%, and in British pounds remained at 0.02%.
The agency also clarified that 65.13% of the public debt has a fixed interest rate, while 13.17% is tied to the IMF rate, 6.95% to SOFR, 0.72% to TORF, and 3.87% to EURIBOR.
The rate for another 3.08% of the government debt is tied to the consumer price index, and 6.73% to the NBU discount rate. These are government bonds from the NBU’s portfolio. The most recent of these were securities linked to the key policy rate, which the NBU bought back as part of the budget’s emission financing.
Finally, 0.32% of the state debt has a rate linked to the Ukrainian index of rates on retail deposits, which is used in portfolio guarantee programs.
As reported, Ukraine’s public and publicly guaranteed debt in 2022 increased by $13.4 billion.
As part of the recent first review of the EFF program with Ukraine, the IMF significantly improved its forecast for public debt growth this year – from 98.3% of GDP to 88.1% of GDP, in particular by revising its estimate at the end of last year from 81.7% of GDP to 78.5% of GDP.
