More money with faster delivery to Ukraine is the goal behind the IMF’s announcement yesterday of a switch to negotiating an 18-month ‘Standby’ deal, instead of a 3-year Extended Fund Facility.

More money with faster delivery to Ukraine is the goal behind the IMF’s announcement yesterday of a switch to negotiating an 18-month ‘Standby’ deal, instead of a 3-year Extended Fund Facility. “It’s easier to get $5 billion from the IMF in 2020-21 under the stand-by program than under the EFF program,” Vladyslav Rashkovan Ukraine’s representative to the IMF wrote last night on Facebook. “The EFF program…does not require “titanic” efforts to promote structural reforms.” A Standby deal would also unlock additional promised macro-financial aid to Ukraine: €500 million from the EU; and up to $1 billion from the World Bank.