President of Ukraine Volodymyr Zelenskyy held a meeting with the management of the largest asset management company in the world — BlackRock.
The parties discussed the details of the creation of an investment fund to restore the economy of Ukraine with the involvement of public and private capital.
At the meeting, Ukraine's Ministry of Economy signed an agreement with BlackRock Financial Market Advisory on providing support services to the Ukraine Development Fund.
The main goal of the fund's creation is to attract private and public capital for implementing large-scale business projects in Ukraine.
As Zelenskyy stated at the meeting, since independence, truly large and strategic private capital in volumes that would correspond to the country's scale and capabilities has never come to Ukraine.
"This will be a strong signal of strengthening the investment climate. It is important not only for our people, our society, but also for business, entrepreneurs abroad. Today is a historic moment because, since the very first days of independence, we have not had such huge investment cases in Ukraine. We are proud that we can initiate such a process," the Head of State said.
According to him, for the transparency and success of the project implementation, Ukraine attracts the best financial and consulting organizations in the world — BlackRock, JP Morgan, McKinsey, and others.
The President said that the creation and launch of the fund would make it possible to attract capital and start the active reconstruction of the country's economy and the creation of new enterprises immediately after the cessation of active hostilities.
"We will be able to offer interesting projects to invest in energy, security, agriculture, logistics, infrastructure, medicine, IT, and many other areas. We want global partners to come who can provide us with large investments," Zelenskyy said.
Charles Hatami, who oversees BlackRock FMA in his capacity as Global Head of the Financial and Strategic Investors Group (FSIG), said: “BlackRock is honoured to be assisting the Ukrainian people by advising the government on the launch of the Ukraine Development Fund. The reconstruction of the country will create significant opportunity for investors to participate in rebuilding the economy. The investment challenge facing Ukraine in the coming years will be enormous, and it will only be through the close cooperation of public and private capital that we will be able to address the scale of funding needed.”