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Eastern Europe
October 19, 2018 www.intellinews.com I Page 17
term risks exist despite the current favourable economic situation.
Economic growth rates in Belarus are high, having reached 3.7% year-on-year in January-Septem- ber. The result was mainly attributed to a two-digit growth in non-primary exports fuelled by external demand and the depreciation of the real effective exchange rate.
At the same time, an unbalanced growth in salaries and the reduction in the real refinancing rate have resulted in an accelerated increase
in domestic demand, the impact of which was partly compensated by consumer and investment imports that have led, among other things, to the worsening of the current account, the EFSD added in the statement.
Over the first seven months of the year, the current account deficit widened to 2.5% of GDP, compared to 1% of GDP in the same period of 2017.
Ukraine to sue Russia over Crimea losses of insolvent Delta Bank
bne IntelliNews
Ukraine's Individuals Deposit Guarantee Fund (IDGF) is going to file a lawsuit against Russia
to the international arbitration tribunal seeking to collect compensation for the loss of invest- ment on the territory of Crimea, which was il- legally annexed by Russia in 2014, by Delta Bank, which went bankrupt in 2015.
The National Bank of Ukraine (NBU) has declared Delta Bank, the country’s fourth largest bank by assets at the time, insolvent as its owner had been unable to take effective, efficient and timely
At the same time, the favourable trade environ- ment and economic recovery have made it pos- sible to ensure a significant consolidated fiscal surplus of 6.8% of GDP in January-July, compared to 3.6% of GDP in the same period of 2017.
"The cuts in fiscal expenditure for supporting state-owned enterprises, including the replenishment of their charter capitals and the performance of guarantees under foreign and domestic loans, were a significant contributor to the increase in fiscal surplus," the EFSD's statement reads.
Despite a reduction in public debt to 36.3% of GDP as of early August from 39.3% at the beginning
of the year, the figure did not change in absolute terms. The reasons for this were the attraction
of new foreign investment loans, the issuance of internal debt, and the depreciation of the Belaru- sian rouble, the Russia-led institution added.
measures to improve the financial state of the bank. Simultaneously, three other lenders con- trolled by Delta's owner, Kyiv-based millionaire Mykola Lagun — Kreditprombank, Omega Bank and Astra Bank — were also declared insolvent by the regulator.
According to an IDGF statement published on Oc- tober 16, the fund will seek participants for a ten- der to procure services to accompany lawsuits in international arbitration tribunals with the aim "to recover compensation from Russia for the loss of