How the war in Ukraine has inspired aid from banks, credit unions

December 19, 2022 11:28 AM

Over the course of Russia's war on Ukraine, financial institutions in the U.S. have bolstered organizations abroad and helped refugees begin to rebuild their lives.

Banks and credit unions alike launched tailored relief campaigns ranging from partial loan forgiveness and fuel donations for Ukrainian farmers to special accounts and recruitment efforts for refugees.

Below is a compilation of American Banker coverage that highlights how institutions have stepped up to help.

Demonstrators during a protest against the Russian invasion of Ukraine in front of the United Nations Headquarters in New York. Many people and organizations, including credit unions, are offering financial aid and other support to the people in Ukraine.

Michael Nagle/Bloomberg

Ukrainian-American credit unions mustering aid for war victims

Article by Frank Gargano

Ukrainian-American credit unions — which were founded in the U.S. to provide financial services to immigrants from Ukraine — are spearheading efforts to provide aid to those impacted by Russia's invasion.

"We can certainly as individual credit unions, and as a national association, directly help monetarily … but in the larger scope of things, we can act as a lever to leverage and provide information to where the greater general American public, and specifically our brothers and sisters in American credit unions, can funnel their donations," said Andrew Horbachevsky, who chairs the Ukrainian American Credit Union Association.

Ukrainian-American credit unions came about after World War II to help refugees who emigrated to the U.S. Today, the UACUA has 12 member organizations which have a combined 100,000 members and roughly $4 billion of assets. Horbachevsky said he and his board are working with member credit unions to help establish donation accounts for both members and nonmembers to contribute support for those in Ukraine affected by the Russian invasion that began Feb. 24.

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A destroyed building in Kyiv following Russian missile strikes on March 2.

Bloomberg

'You can hear the bombs': A fintech developer's life in Ukraine

Article by John Adams

There's a near constant pounding of explosions, a deep rattling thunder that won't stop. The piercing roar of jets. Air raid sirens. Traffic jams caused by fleeing vehicles.

These are the sounds of war. For Yevhen Matasar, it's the sound of his country being torn to shreds. "This is a very difficult situation," said Matasar from his car, parked in the dark outside a home in a small Ukrainian village as night fell. "You can hear the bombs and the fighter planes."

Matasar is a web developer who joined Paysera, a Lithuanian digital payments company based in Vlinius, in 2020. It's a lifetime ago for Matasar, who moved to a rural location about 20 miles from Kyiv when the Russian invasion began.

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Bloomberg

Ukraine's financial community carries on despite Russia's invasion

Article by Penny Crosman

Alyona Mysko has been working for several weeks in a bomb shelter in Lviv. During a Zoom call a day after images and videos of Russian army war crimes in Bucha had been published, she seemed shaken.

"It was the most difficult day," said Mysko, who is the CEO and founder of the Ukrainian fintech Fuelfinance. "For everyone it was a very huge shock. We have learned about what is going on, but now we read stories from all these people, because they have started to talk about what was going on there. It was really very bad."

For people working at fintechs and banks in Ukraine, job stress is sky high as they try to focus on their work while missiles fly overhead, horrific atrocities are committed in nearby cities and 11 million people have been driven from their homes. But many are carrying on anyway, trying to keep business as close to normal as possible, ensure employees are safe, and support their country however they can.

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Arrivals in the Polish Capital as Outflow of Ukrainians Exceeds 2 Million

Displaced Ukrainians rest while waiting at the Warsaw Central railway station in Warsaw, Poland.

Bloomberg

Worldwide Foundation of Credit Unions sends aid to Ukraine

Article by Frank Gargano

The Worldwide Foundation of Credit Unions has sent financial aid to refugees of the Russian invasion of Ukraine and plans to follow up with more.

The fundraising arm of the Madison, Wisconsin-based World Council of Credit Unions announced that it has released $50,000 from the Ukrainian Credit Union Displacement Fund to the Podolsk Regional Development Agency, a nongovernmental organization helping to offer humanitarian aid to those Ukrainians currently sheltered in the Vinnytsia region of the country.

"This is the first step in our commitment to put more than half of all initial donations to our Ukrainian Credit Union Displacement Fund toward humanitarian relief efforts," Mike Reuter, executive director of the foundation, said in a March press release. "More relief dollars will also soon be sent to assist Ukrainians who have sought refuge in neighboring countries."

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How eight banks are weighing the fallout from the Ukraine war

Cardshow by Allissa Kline and Kevin Wack

Russia's two-week-old invasion of Ukraine has rapidly upended a wide range of global industries —from energy to entertainment to fast food.

Within the financial services sector, some of the biggest impacts have been on payments companies. Earlier this year, Visa, Mastercard, American Express and PayPal all announced bans in Russia.

There have also been massive repercussions for Russian banks. Economic sanctions imposed by the United States and other nations have frozen large swaths of Russia's financial system, including its access to the Society for Worldwide Interbank Financial Telecommunications, which processes international payments.

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Photos of volunteers with Caritas Internationalis, an association of more than 160 Catholic-based relief organizations, sorting supplies for Ukrainian refugees.

Bruce K. Foulke

U.S. credit unions bolster Poland’s support of Ukrainian refugees

Article by Frank Gargano

Credit union leaders from Poland and the U.S. have launched a new fund to gather aid for Ukrainian refugees.

The Polish American Credit Union Support Fund was founded in March of this year through a collaborative effort between Bruce K. Foulke, president and chief executive of the $4.1 billion-asset American Heritage Credit Union in Philadelphia, and Brian Branch, former president and CEO of the World Council of Credit Unions in Madison, Wisconsin. To date, more than $400,000 has been raised to help provide necessary medical supplies and organize housing for displaced refugees.

"Watching TV in February and seeing everything going down with no initial help, I got pissed off," Foulke said. In addition to being CEO, "I'm a volunteer firefighter and I just said, screw this, I gotta do something, I can't sit here."

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Borys Sohatiuk, a member of Persha Podilska Fermerska Credit Union who works as a poultry farmer. "When credit union employees offered to fill in an application for [partial loan] reimbursement, I was skeptical at first … but when I received a message that the funds had arrived, I was very happy," Sohatiuk said.

Persha Podilska Fermerska Credit Union

Ukrainian farmers get loan relief from credit unions worldwide

Article by Frank Gargano

Deep within of Ukraine, farmers are receiving aid through a program founded by the Worldwide Foundation for Credit Unions.

The philanthropic and fundraising arm of the organization has assisted 100 farmers since the Ukraine Agricultural Loan Reimbursement Program launched in June, with an initial disbursement of $100,000. It plans to offer aid to at least 585 farmers by covering 10% of their agricultural loan principal payments.

The Ukrainian Credit Union Displacement Fund, which the WFCU founded on Feb. 27 — three days after the war broke out — provided grants for the first disbursements. The fund raised more than $300,000 in its first few weeks and by mid-March was able to release $50,000 to the Podolsk Regional Development Agency, a nongovernmental organization helping to offer humanitarian aid to Ukrainians sheltered in the Vinnytsia region of the country.

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Volodymyr Sidorovsky (left), chief executive of Credit Union Anisia in Lviv, Ukraine, presenting a member with sheets of fuel coupons to be redeemed at various OKKO gas stations.

WFCU

Credit unions' Ukrainian aid campaigns focus on farming, technology

Article by Frank Gargano

Against the backdrop of missile barrages and waves of fleeing residents, Ukrainian credit unions are working nonstop to continue operations in any capacity.

"In some cases, [credit unions are] missing doors to their brick-and-mortar locations, and despite that they're still concerned that they want to get in their regulatory quarterly filings so that they can continue to exist and support their local constituents. … In the face of all this adversity, they're still trying to do the right thing," said Andrew Horbachevsky, who chairs the Ukrainian American Credit Union Association.

Credit unions from across the world are doing their own part, not only to keep their Ukrainian counterparts operational but to keep key components of the nation's economy running.

The Worldwide Foundation for Credit Unions donated more than 17,000 gallons of fuel to Ukrainian farmers and other agricultural producers in October. The WFCU's Fuel Disbursement Program purchased roughly $100,000 worth of diesel from the Ukrainian fuel chain OKKO, using backing from its Ukrainian Credit Union Displacement Fund.

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"For us, it's personal," said Dennis Larionov, CEO of Re:start Financial (seated at right). The neobank is based in Austin, Texas, although it also has employees in Ukraine, Kazakhstan, and Uzbekistan.

Banks, fintechs help Ukrainian refugees rebuild their lives

Article by Miriam Cross

The challenges refugees face when setting up bank accounts range from language barriers to finding institutions that recognize their identity documents. Some financial institutions in North America have explicitly opened their doors to refugees as both customers and prospective employees, and are working to ease such difficulties.

TD Bank Group in Canada said in March that it was actively recruiting refugees for employment at the bank. Apple Bank in New York City announced in August that it was welcoming Ukrainian refugees to open accounts in-branch, in partnership with the Hebrew Free Loan Society. Royal Bank of Canada offers credit products to newcomers to Canada — which it defines as any individual under one of three visa classes and more broadly who has been in the country for less than five years — that don't require a credit history.

The United Nations reported in May that the number of people forced to flee their homes surpassed 100 million for the first time on record, with the war in Ukraine one factor in tipping this figure over that mark. In September, President Biden announced that the U.S. set the refugee admissions target at 125,000 for the upcoming fiscal year. But efforts to bank this population are largely nascent.

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