Ukraine's banking sector sees profit down 22 pct in 3 quarters

KIEV, Oct. 27 (Xinhua) -- The net profit of Ukrainian banks slumped 22 percent in the first three quarters of this year, Ukrinform reported on Tuesday.

"Banks' profits have dropped. The profit reached 37.7 billion Hryvnia (1.3 billion U.S. dollars) over the nine months of 2020. This is 22 percent less year-on-year," Ukrinform quoted the First Deputy Governor of Ukrainian National Bank Kateryna Rozhkova as saying on Tuesday.

Rozhkova noted that a number of small banks in Ukraine are facing the risks of failures.

She explained that the difficulties that some small banks go through are not caused by the impact of the coronavirus outbreak but by the unresolved problems of previous years.

This year the banking sphere, as well as Ukraine's economy as a whole, has suffered a decline due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

In 2019, the Ukrainian banking sector received a record net profit of 60 billion Hryvnia (2.1 billion U.S. dollars), which is almost three times more than a year earlier.