Banks issued 4.42 thousand concessional loans under the state program “Affordable loans 5-7-9%” for UAH 10.27 billion in the last month of 2022, which is 21% or UAH 2.2 billion more than in November 2022, the Ministry of Finance said on its website on Monday.
According to its data, 1.66 thousand such loans worth 8.1 billion UAH were issued in November.
The Ministry of Finance specified that since the start of the program “5-7-9” business entities have received 52.85 thousand loans totaling 165.77 billion UAH from authorized banks, of which almost 34 thousand – from banks in the public sector for a total of 66.26 billion UAH.
It is noted that during the martial law in Ukraine as part of the state program 18.03 thousand loan agreements totaling 76.15 billion UAH (including 13.52 thousand by public sector banks for 39.62 billion UAH) were concluded.
According to the published data, the most credits were granted for war purposes – 38.35 billion UAH, 0.82 billion UAH of credit means were given to entrepreneurs for investment purposes, 6.34 billion UAH were allocated as anti-crisis credits, 4.38 billion UAH were given as refinancing of already received loans and 25.74 billion UAH were loans for agricultural producers.
As reported, the state program “Affordable credits 5-7-9%” with compensation of interest rates by the state was initiated in February 2020 to support projects of Ukrainian micro and small enterprises. Provision of three possible rates – 5%, 7% or 9% – on loans depends on the size of the business and the period of its operation. At the end of October last year the Cabinet of Ministers made changes to the conditions for granting loans under the program “Affordable credits 5-7-9%” and allowed to involve private entrepreneurs with annual income up to UAH 50 mln), also it became possible to fully compensate the rate.
Now 45 banks work with the program “Affordable credits 5-7-9%”.
As the National Bank reported in its Financial Stability Report in late 2022, the prevalence of programs with up to zero rate compensation, rising market interest rates and rapid portfolio growth have significantly increased the government’s financing costs for the program: more than 9 billion UAH must be paid this year instead of the planned 3 billion UAH, resulting in a government debt of 2.6 billion UAH as of early November, which is equivalent to two months of interest compensation and has kept banks from further using the program.
“In conditions of war, government support is a guarantee of business access to credit. So the weighty role of the program will remain in 2023. Since expanding the program will require additional resources, its design should be optimized. Most businesses have already adapted to the war and have resumed production, so an increase in rates should be considered. A separate design is needed for the program for agricultural producers, given the difficulties with the sale of crops due to the destruction of logistics,” pointed out the National Bank.
According to statistics from the NBU, if at the end of 2020, loans provided by the program “5-7-9”, took 5% of the net corporate portfolio of hryvnia, then at the end of 2021 – 18%, and as of December 2022 – 26%.
In turn, head of the Ministry of Finance Serhiy Marchenko reported that the state budget-2023 provides for 14 billion UAH for the program.
