President Petro Poroshenko introduced new Governor of the National Bank of Ukraine Yakiv Smoliy to the NBU staff.
The President thanked people’s deputies of the Verkhovna Rada who voted "in support of independence of the National Bank", appointing a new Governor of the NBU. He underlined the importance of this decision for "the confidence, firmness and stability of the banking and financial system of the country", as well as for the reliable cooperation with international financial organizations such as the International Monetary Fund.
“This means a breakthrough, because we did not have a single day when the country remained without a leadership of the National Bank,” the President stressed and expressed confidence that the steps of the new NBU leadership will be supported by the President, Parliament and Government.
“The top priority is trust and independence of the NBU,” the Head of State emphasized. The President noted that the main constitutional function of the National Bank was to ensure stability of the national currency and foreign exchange reserves.
The Head of State thanked Valeria Gontareva for her work. According to him, a lot of people predicted Ukraine wouldn’t avoid default in 2014. There were lots of reasons for that - empty foreign exchange reserves, treasury account, the number of bad loans reached an incredible level.
“There were few brave men to deal with those Augean stables,” the President told. He noted that the National Bank had acted responsibly and professionally in the most difficult times and the leadership of the international financial organizations and banks had also praised that.
“Probably for the first time in our history the National Bank was really independent over the past 4 years,” the President said. According to him, no politicians were giving orders to it on any case.
The President also noted that significant steps had been taken to reform the banking sector and ensure the restoration of its stability when sometimes very unpopular decisions had been made.
“Now, Yakiv Vasyliovych faces no less ambitious tasks,” the Head of State noted, reminding that the National Council of Reforms had presented new bills on on currency transactions, which significantly liberalize currency activity and cancel decrees of the Cabinet of Ministers approved in 1993.
"The determination, ambition and courage of the National Bank reform team are extremely high," the President said. He stressed that the ambitious tasks on the comprehensive reform program would be submitted to the Parliament shortly after a thorough discussion with business.
In turn, former Governor of the National Bank of Ukraine Valeria Gontareva thanked the President for non-interference in the work of the NBU and constant attention and assistance. "In three years when I was in charge of the NBU, the President never demanded anything from the NBU. The President supported the independence of the National Bank not in words, but in actions. This gave us an opportunity to really create an institutional independence," Valeria Gontareva noted. She also stressed that the NBU succeeded in creating an institutional independence due to the adoption of the Law on the National Bank in 2015, which was supported by the Head of State.
"This was the law that gave us an opportunity to be independent and consolidated our mandate of the National Bank to ensure financial and price stability in the state. We have rebuilt and purified the financial system. This allowed us to have financial stability in our state," Valeria Gontareva said and thanked the whole team of the NBU for professionalism and patriotism.
Newly appointed Governor of the National Bank of Ukraine Yakiv Smoliy assured that the main financial regulator of the country would be clearly guided in its activities by the Law on the National Bank and outlined the main immediate and mid-term priorities of the NBU: ensuring financial stability, stability of the banking system, lending renewal, effective regulation of the financial sector, currency liberalization, introduction of new financial mechanisms and integration into the EU standards in the financial and banking sphere.
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