Ukraine has hired a Rothschild & Co-led consortium to help prepare possible sales of the state’s stakes in Ukrgasbank and Sense Bank, marking a new step in a privatisation process that remains at an early stage.
The Finance Ministry, Ukrgasbank, Sense Bank and N. M. Rothschild & Sons Limited have signed tripartite agreements for financial advisory services. N. M. Rothschild & Sons Limited is part of the Rothschild & Co group. The work will be carried out with FinPoint, a Ukrainian investment banking company, as part of the consortium.
The appointment followed a competitive selection process. Its purpose is to help the state and the two banks organise the groundwork required before any sale process can move forward. That distinction is important: the agreements concern preparation, not the transfer of any shares or a completed transaction.
The adviser’s remit includes coordinating due diligence on both banks and helping establish an initial sale value. It will also prepare information for potential investors, present the institutions to the international market, seek to attract investor interest and assist with organising a competition for the state-owned stakes. These are practical steps intended to make a later process more structured and competitive, rather than a decision on the eventual buyer.
For customers, the immediate position is unchanged. The contracts do not alter ownership of either bank, and both Ukrgasbank and Sense Bank are continuing normal operations and meeting their obligations to clients. The banks are expected to set out further stages of the preparation process through their own official channels. No buyer has been named and no completed sale has been announced.
The contracts sit within a longer-running effort to reduce the state’s share of Ukraine’s banking sector. The government adopted a resolution to prepare the sale of the two holdings in October 2025. Later that month, it approved the procedure for engaging a sale adviser. The Finance Ministry opened a competition to select one in March 2026, and the government also formed a commission for the intended sales.
Bringing in a financial adviser does not settle the central questions that would accompany any eventual privatisation, including investor appetite, valuation and the terms of a sale competition. Those matters will need to be addressed during the preparatory work. The present agreements establish who will support that work, while leaving the banks in state ownership.
At the beginning of July, Ukrgasbank had total assets of UAH 228.74 billion and ranked seventh among Ukraine’s 59 banks. Sense Bank had UAH 157.73 billion in total assets and ranked ninth. Those figures describe the banks’ scale within the system; they are not a valuation of either institution or a price for the state’s stake. Establishing an initial sale value forms part of the adviser’s preparatory role.
Ukrgasbank and Sense Bank are both significant institutions in Ukraine’s banking system. The planned process therefore has implications beyond the mechanics of a single transaction: it is intended to create the information, valuation and investor-engagement framework on which a future decision can be based. The next substantive development will be whether the preparation produces a formal sale process and disclosed terms for potential investors.
