When Sergii Naumov took over as chief executive at one of Ukraine¡¯s biggest state banks before Russia¡¯s invasion, his job was to privatize it. Now he¡¯s glad he didn¡¯t get the chance.
The role of Ukraine¡¯s banking system is one of the less told stories of the nation¡¯s resilience. It survived the loss of assets to occupation, power outages and a 30% collapse in gross domestic product without bank runs, service interruption or any significant closures. State-controlled lenders like Naumov¡¯s Oschadbank JSC have played a part.
¡°Generally, when you have this state-owned economy it is not good, but during the war it helped,¡± says Naumov. ¡°We know what our mission is.¡±
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