The national Bank of Ukraine (NBU) has kept the discount rate at 14%. This was stated by the head of the NBU Valery Gontareva. at a press briefing on monetary policy of the national Bank.
The forecasts of the regulator the level of inflation remained unchanged.
This year, the national Bank announces the inflation rate is 8%, with possible deviations of +/- 2%. Gontareva stressed that in 2017 the first three quarters will remain high growth of inflation, but at the end of the year the NBU predicts inflation to the level of 9.1%.
In the following, 2018, inflation, the NBU is 6% (also with possible deviation to 2%), and in 2019, the inflation will drop to 5% with a deviation of one percent.
At the moment, given the blockade on Donbass, NBU sees no reason for easing monetary policy. As reported Gontareva, if the blockade continues, the impact on the economy of Ukraine expressed in the loss of growth of gross domestic product by 1.3 percentage points, to 1.5% instead of the previously forecasted 2.8 percent GDP growth in 2017.
We will remind, past reducing the discount rate of the NBU held 28 October 2016, reducing the rate from 15% to 14%.
The national Bank uses the discount rate as a benchmark, how much it should cost money. In addition, the cost of refinancing of banks is also determined by the discount rate of the NBU at lower rates, banks will have to spend less money to service the refinance.
