On January 21 Ukrainian and Russian media dedicated a great deal of attention to the claim that seemingly at the World Economic forum in Davos Ukrainian banks were declared to be the most unreliable. The source for this claim was the Soundness of Banks section of the Global Competiveness report 2015-2016. This news was carried by Ukrainian Korrespondent, Ekonomichna Pravda, Channel 24, Capital, Delovaya Stolitsa and Russian sites Lifenews, news.mail.ru, independent-news.ru and others.
None of these reports specified when the bank ranking report was published nor how the ratings list was determined, except for stating that Ukraine was ranked last (140th). The Global Competitiveness Report was published in September 2015 as shown by a basic Google search. In late September Canadian media also reported that their banks were rated the soundest in the world for eight straight consecutive years. This news is nearly five months old.
It is also important to point out that Ukrainian banks were ranked the most unreliable by Ukrainian business leaders who answered the Executive Opinion Survey conducted from February through June, and were asked “In your country, how do you assess the soundness of banks?” on a scale of 1 to 7. The full report can be downloaded here.
