MOSCOW (April 8): US investment bank Goldman Sachs said bond pricing inferred that markets believe there is 70% probability of a Ukraine peace deal, up sharply from before the November election of US President Donald Trump.

"Our modelling suggests that current market pricing for a peace deal has risen from below 50% prior to the US election to around 70% at present," Goldman Sachs said in research note to clients.

It added, however, that this is slightly lower than a peak of 76% in February.

Trump, who says he wants to be remembered as a peacemaker, has repeatedly said he wants to end the "bloodbath" of the three-year conflict in Ukraine, which his administration casts as a proxy war between the US and Russia.

President Vladimir Putin said last month that Russia supports a US proposal for a ceasefire in Ukraine in principle, but that fighting could not be paused until a number of crucial conditions are worked out or clarified.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy has said that Putin's conditions for a ceasefire are unrealistic, and has accused the Russian leader of wanting to continue the war.

Russia currently controls a little under one-fifth of Ukraine, including Crimea which Russia annexed in 2014, and most but not all of four other regions which Moscow now claims are part of Russia — a claim not recognised by most countries.

Read also:
Ukraine plans to send envoys to US for talks on minerals deal

Uploaded by Tham Yek Lee