The volume of foreign currency sales by the population of Ukraine in May exceeded the volume of its purchase by $262.2 million, which is higher than the April figure of $237.8 million, the National Bank of Ukraine reported.
According to the data on its website, “net” sales are still formed due to non-cash currency in the conditions of the almost complete ban on its purchase by the population introduced by the National Bank since the beginning of the war: in May, the volume of currency sales decreased to $244.1 million from $252.6 million in April and $375.3 million in March, while purchase volumes were $10.2 million compared to $8.6 million and $18.6 million, respectively.
In the cash market, the volume of transactions increased significantly due to the removal of the ceiling on the sale price of the currency by the National Bank. If in March-April banks sold to the population $72 million and $62.7 million, respectively, then in May – $216.9 million.
The volume of purchases of foreign currency from the population on the official market in May also increased – to $188.6 million from $68.8 million in April and $71.3 million in March.
At the same time, in general, in May, bank customers began to buy significantly more non-cash currency than to sell: “net” purchase amounted to $1,184 million compared to $421.2 million in April and $165 million in March.
In general, since the beginning of this year, the population has sold foreign currencies by $290.4 million more than they bought, while bank customers, on the contrary, bought it by $4.02 billion more than they sold.
According to the NBU data, the turnover on the official cash foreign exchange market tripled in May compared to March-April, but it is still 7 times lower than February, and 10 times lower than December.
The volume of sales of non-cash currency decreased by an average of half compared to pre-war levels, while the volume of purchases fell by almost two orders of magnitude.
NBU interventions in May rose to $3.4 billion from $2.2 billion in April, $1.78 billion in March, $0.31 billion in February and $1.31 billion in January.
