IMF simplifies conditions for opening new program for Ukraine: VAT threshold for sole proprietors raised to UAH 4 mln – PM

The International Monetary Fund (IMF) mission has simplified the agreements reached in November to open a new Extended Fund Facility (EFF) for Ukraine, including revising the preliminary measures and structural benchmarks, Prime Minister Yulia Svyrydenko announced.

"The Ukrainian program will be reviewed at the next meeting of the IMF Board of Directors," she told reporters, noting that the revision of the agreements was influenced, among other things, by consultations directly with the Fund’s Managing Director, Kristalina Georgieva, who visited Kyiv in January during the widespread shelling of Ukrainian energy infrastructure.

According to Svyrydenko, the most sensitive issues of the IMF program are the taxation of sole proprietors.

"The details are important here. Working with the IMF, we agreed to raise the threshold (annual income) for VAT introduction for sole proprietors to UAH 4 million (equivalent to approximately EUR 85,000) – this is the maximum VAT level on goods in Europe. Therefore, these changes will not affect two-thirds of all sole proprietors," the head of government noted.

She clarified that the question of when exactly the regulation will come into effect is the subject of our further work.

"There’s a lot of discussion about how this will be implemented. We’re working with parliamentarians and will likely adopt these measures as part of the consolidated tax bill. It will also address issues related to digital platforms, parcels, and the retention of military tax after martial law ends, which are well received by businesses," Svyrydenko said.

The Prime Minister recalled that Ukraine’s cooperation program with the IMF is the anchor for all international financial support, in particular for receiving a EUR 90 billion loan from the European Union.

As reported, a four-year EFF program with the IMF totaling $15.6 billion has been in effect since March 2023, with the next, 9th tranche, amounting to SDR1.117 billion ($1.6 billion at the current exchange rate), scheduled for December 2025.

Initially, the current program envisaged total external financing for Ukraine with the participation of international partners of $115 billion in the base case and $140 billion in the negative case, but as the war dragged on, these figures were increased to $153 billion and $165 billion, respectively.

During the IMF mission to Kyiv from September 3 to September 10, 2025, Svyrydenko, along with the governor of the National Bank of Ukraine and the Minister of Finance, formally requested a new program, tentatively for 2026–2029. The need to consider a new program stems from the fact that the war unleashed by Russia is protracted, while the current EFF program is scheduled to end by March 2027.

At the end of November 2025, Ukraine and the Fund reached a staff-level agreement (SLA) on a new four-year Extended Fund Facility (EFF) program worth approximately $8.1 billion.