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PrivatBank plots course through Ukrainian storms

The chairperson of PrivatBank’s supervisory board talks to James King about the legal challenges which followed the bank’s nationalisation and the ongoing struggle to bring reform to Ukraine.
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Since the Maidan revolution of 2014, Ukraine’s development trajectory has been defined by turbulent progress. Encouraging political and economic reforms have occurred in fits and starts, against a backdrop of a simmering conflict in the east of the country. But the maturation of Ukraine’s democracy has been dented by the presence of powerful oligarchs, who continue to vie for influence in the corridors of administrative power. These trends, among others, have also shaped the recent evolution of the country’s banking sector and, in particular, the fortunes of Ukraine’s largest lender, PrivatBank. 

Following its nationalisation in 2016, in response to the authorities’ discovery of a $5.5bn hole in the balance sheet and as part of a wider clean-up of the banking system, the lender has charted a course towards sustainable long-term growth. It has done this while fending off legal challenges by one of its former owners and co-founders, businessman Ihor Kolomoisky, who contests the basis of the nationalisation. The resulting struggle for control of the bank has come, in many ways, to be one of the defining stories of Ukraine’s contemporary political economy. 

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