Ukraine will not receive second tranche of a $17-billion loan program from IMF this year

Ukraine is unlikely to receive a second tranche of a $17-billion loan program from the International Monetary Fund this year as expected, Finance Minister Oleksander Shlapak said on Tuesday, in the latest economic blow to the debt-ridden country.
Ukraine, which has been fighting pro-Russian separatists in its east and struggling to resolve a months-long gas pricing dispute with Moscow, badly needs cash to support its budget, pay off debts and prop up its faltering hryvnia currency.
Kiev had expected that a second tranche, worth $2.7 billion, of the IMF bailout would come in December after the Fund’s mission was due later this month. But Shlapak said an IMF visit was unlikely before a new government was formed.
President Petro Poroshenko hailed a sweeping victory for pro-Europe parties in parliamentary election on Sunday, but it may take a month or more before a new cabinet takes over.
«An IMF mission will come when a new government is in place,» Shlapak told journalists. «They want to talk to a new government. The key question would be the adoption of a realistic 2014 budget.»
He added that most likely, the tranche would be postponed until next year.
«The maximum that we would like to achieve is to get an IMF decision (on the tranche disbursement this year),» he said.
The mission will also decide how much additional financial aid Kiev may need, after warning in September that if Ukraine’s conflict with the separatists runs into next year, the country may need as much as $19 billion in extra aid.

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