Currency Law entered into force

Law of Ukraine “On Currency and Currency Operations” No. 2473-VIII dated 21 June 2018 (“Law”) came into effect on 07 July 2018

The Law becomes applicable after a transitional period of seven months from its effective date. At that, within six months of the transitional period the National Bank of Ukraine (“NBU”) will revise its regulatory acts in order to ensure implementation of the Law and detail the new rules. Thereafter, the NBU is obliged to promulgate the said regulatory acts no later than 30 calendar days before the Law becomes applicable.  

Key innovations:

I.     Once applicable, the Law will lift a number of currency restrictions, in particular:

1)  Individuals and business will be able to invest abroad without obtaining an individual license from the NBU, specifically: to invest in securities, property rights, real estate abroad, to deposit foreign currency with foreign banks (including the currency originated from Ukraine), to import and export securities into/from Ukraine, etc.

2)  It will no longer be required to register loans obtained from non-residents with the NBU.

3)  The 180-day term set by law for making payments in foreign economic transactions will be cancelled (unless the NBU will deem it necessary to establish this term in its resolution).

4)  If the amount of a foreign economic transaction does not exceed UAH 150,000, such transaction will not be subject to currency control.

5)  Sanctions that involve termination of foreign economic activities and application of individual licensing to currency regulation violators will be cancelled.

II.   The NBU will gradually lift other effective currency restrictions subject to favorable economic conditions, until currency transactions are freely performed based on the principle “everything which is not explicitly forbidden by law is allowed”.

III.  Currency control will be replaced by currency supervision over the compliance with the limits set.

IV.  If necessary, the NBU may, at its own discretion, impose restrictions (protection measures) as specified by the Law. These restrictions will be temporary and last up to six months.

We will be glad to provide you with our advisory support on all matters related to the aforementioned legislative changes.