The National Bank of Ukraine lowered its benchmark interest rate by 50 bps to 17.5 percent on April 25th of 2019, matching market expectations and bringing borrowing costs to the lowest since August of 2018. Policymakers said the cut is in line with reaching inflation target of 5 percent. In March, annual inflation rate fell to 8.6 percent from 8.8 percent in February, in line with central bank estimates. Policymakers expect inflation to fall to 6.3% by the end of 2019 and 5.0% by the end of 2020. Also, GDP growth is seen slowing to 2.5% in 2019; and then accelerating to 2.9% in 2020 and 3.7% in 2021. Policymakers added further rate reductions will depend on the implementation of inflationary risks and the improvement of inflation expectations. Interest Rate in Ukraine averaged 38.83 percent from 1992 until 2019, reaching an all time high of 300 percent in October of 1994 and a record low of 6.50 percent in August of 2013.
Interest Rate in Ukraine is expected to be 17.00 percent by the end of this quarter, according to Trading Economics global macro models and analysts expectations. Looking forward, we estimate Interest Rate in Ukraine to stand at 16.50 in 12 months time. In the long-term, the Ukraine Interest Rate is projected to trend around 16.00 percent in 2020, according to our econometric models.