The arrival of the mission of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) to Kyiv has been postponed, a source in the government has told Interfax-Ukraine.
“Due to internal reasons of the Fund the arrival of the mission has been postponed. The new date is not disclosed, but they will arrive soon,” the source said.
As reported, the IMF mission under the Extended Fund Facility (EFF) program was expected to arrive to Ukraine on October 26.
The four-year EFF program for Ukraine totaling SDR 12.348 billion (about $17 billion at a current exchange rates), opened by the IMF in March 2015, originally foresaw quarterly revisions of the program, as well as the issue of four tranches to Kyiv in 2015, and reduction of quarterly tranches in 2016-2018.
However, Ukraine was able to get only the first two tranches and then there was a time gap due to the political crisis and the government change. Negotiations on renewal of funding were resumed after the appearance of a new Cabinet headed by Volodymyr Groysman in April. Initially it was assumed that the third tranche would amount to about $1.7 billion, and the IMF Board of Directors will be able to take their decision in June. But due to non-fulfillment by Ukraine of a number of conditions, the terms have been constantly postponed. This is also the reason why the amount of the loan tranche was reduced to $1 billion. The IMF decided to provide the tranche only in the middle of September.
According to the revised schedule, provision of funds is planned every quarter after revision of the implementation of effectiveness criteria by Ukraine, in particular, the fourth tranche of $1.3 billion – in the middle of November 2016. The largest tranche of over $1.986 billion could be sent in the first quarter of 2017. Then the next two tranches will be reduced to $1.33 billion and the rest five tranches – to $735 million.
Ukraine, meanwhile, is not keeping up with the terms of implementing the effectiveness criteria outlined in the memorandum of economic and financial policy revised when the third tranche was provided.
