The National Bank of Ukraine is updating the list of benchmark domestic government debt securities (benchmark bonds) that the banks have been allowed to use to partially meet the reserve requirements. Effective 14 January 2026:
- the domestic government debt securities identified as ISIN UA4000227201 was excluded from the list of benchmark bonds, given their scheduled redemption was completed on 5 November 2025, and
- instead, the domestic government debt securities identified as ISIN UA4000238844, which were first placed by the Ministry of Finance of Ukraine on 6 January 2026, were added to the benchmark bonds list.
This measure is to stimulate banks’ activity at Ministry of Finance’s auctions to place domestic government debt securities, which is essential for ensuring that the state budget is financed without resorting to monetary financing.
As previously reported, the banks have been able to use the securities on the benchmark bonds list to meet up to 60% of the reserve requirements. The benchmark bonds list is made by the NBU based on the proposals of the Ministry of Finance of Ukraine.
Starting from 14 January 2026, it has included 19 issues of securities, namely: UA4000227490, UA4000228043, UA4000228381, UA4000228811, UA4000229116, UA4000232177, UA4000232607, UA4000232615, UA4000232896, UA4000232912, UA4000233613, UA4000234140, UA4000234553, UA4000234934, UA4000235642, UA4000236418, UA4000236632, UA4000237564, and the new one, UA4000238844.
The updated list of benchmark bonds the banks have been allowed to use to meet in part the reserve requirement was approved by NBU Board Decision No. 8 On Amendments to NBU Board Decision No. 752 dated 23 November 2017 dated 13 January 2026 that came into effect on 14 January 2026.
Reserve requirements are one of the instruments conventionally used by central banks. This is how reserve requirements operate: a bank sets aside in its correspondent account with the central bank an amount of funds identified as a percentage of the bank’s liabilities (also known as reserve ratio). The amount is calculated as an average over the reserve period.
This allows the bank to smooth out potential ad-hoc fluctuations in liquidity and ensure the effective use of reserve requirements for their primary purpose, which is to absorb some of the banking system’s free liquidity.
The banks are allowed to cover a portion of required reserves with benchmark bonds in order to increase the effectiveness of money market regulation and avoid monetary financing of the budget deficit.
Full information on the amount of reserve requirements formed by banks is available here.