Fitch affirms Ukraine's 'Restricted Default' rating until GDP warrants, Ukrenergo Eurobonds restructured

MOSCOW. Dec 9 (Interfax) - Fitch Ratings has affirmed Ukraine's Long-Term Foreign-Currency (LTFC) Issuer Default Rating (IDR) at 'Restricted Default' (RD) until obligations that Ukraine has either suspended or has said it will suspend in the future have been restructured.

"Ukraine's LTFC IDR will remain 'RD' until Fitch judges the exchanges have been completed and relations with a significant majority of external commercial creditors are normalized," Ukrainian media quoted the agency as saying on its website.

Ukraine remains in the process of restructuring its external commercial debt, Fitch said. After the successful completion of its Eurobond debt exchange in September 2024, the government ordered temporary suspensions of payments on an external commercial loan to Cargill of $700 million, suspended from September 3, 2024; $825 million on Ukrenergo's state-guaranteed Eurobond suspended from November 9, 2024; and GDP warrants, suspended from May 31, 2025.

Fitch affirmed Ukraine's local-currency IDRs at 'CCC+'. "The higher Long-Term Local-Currency (LC) IDR reflects Ukraine's continued service of LC debt through the ongoing external commercial debt restructuring process, confirming our expectation of preferential treatment of LC debt obligations," Fitch said.