Consortium Lending and Joint Ventures: New Financial Opportunities for Ukraine’s Recovery

Andrii Hapon, Chairperson of the Management Board of the Business Development Fund, took part in the panel discussion “Future of Embedded Access2Finance”, where he outlined promising financial instruments capable of playing a key role in Ukraine’s post-war recovery.

Consortium Lending as a Partnership Synergy

In his remarks, Mr. Hapon emphasized the importance of consortium lending — a mechanism whereby several banks join forces to provide a large, long-term loan to a single borrower. This format allows participating banks to mitigate individual risks, pool substantial financial resources, and finance large-scale investment and infrastructure projects.

According to him, this practice, which had been partially suspended during the war, is now returning to the Ukrainian financial market. “Today, there are no competitors — only partners,” he noted, highlighting the growing culture of cooperation among banks within consortium structures.

Growing Interest in Joint Ventures with Ukraine

Andrii Hapon also drew attention to the increasing interest from European Union countries in establishing joint ventures with Ukrainian businesses. As he observed, systematic efforts are already underway in Europe to attract private investment to Ukraine, including through state-backed instruments of partner countries.

This approach may unlock new opportunities not only for large corporations but also for medium-sized enterprises, enabling them to find European partners and jointly implement projects in Ukraine. Today, Ukraine possesses a number of unique technologies that are of interest to foreign partners, while at the same time requiring significant modernization of its production capacities. These challenges, he stressed, can be addressed not only through the “purchase and sale of technologies,” but through the creation of joint ventures.

Although large-scale private investment is only beginning to take shape, Andrii Hapon expressed cautious optimism, suggesting that the first such projects could emerge as early as next year. In his view, this would mark an important step toward sustainable economic recovery and Ukraine’s deeper integration into the European financial space.