The Verkhovna Rada failed to vote on a draft law that would allow the nationalization of banks with sanctioned owners

The Verkhovna Rada (Ukrainian Parliament) failed to vote on draft law No. 9107-1, which would have allowed the National Bank to nationalize banks of sanctioned owners.

The MP of the "Voice" faction Yaroslav Zheleznyak reported this.

The document was supported by 212 deputies out of 226 required for approval. 264 MPs voted to send the document for a second reading. Zheleznyak clarifies that the adoption of the draft law is guaranteed by a clause in the IMF memorandum.

According to the MP, the draft law was not adopted, because some of the deputies went somewhere while the speeches on the amendments continued, and were simply absent from the hall before the vote. The draft law will again be submitted for a second reading at the end of May.

• On October 1, 2022, Ukraine introduced sanctions against Russian oligarchs, including Alfa-Bank founder Mykhailo Fridman. Alfa-Bank Ukraine operates in Ukraine. On September 23, the National Bank of Ukraine agreed to changes to the charter of Alfa-Bank Ukraine to rename it to Sense Bank in order not to be "psychologically connected" to the Russian one. In October 2022, peopleʼs deputies from the "Servant of the People" faction publicly spoke about the nationalization of Alfa-Bank.
• In June, the head of the National Agency for the Prevention of Corruption Oleksandr Novikov informed that Friedman was consulting with the Ukrainian authorities about obtaining Ukrainian citizenship and re-registering the main assets in Ukraine. In September, it became known that Friedman offered a billion dollars for a Ukrainian bank in exchange for the lifting of sanctions.