Case: where to keep Dana's savings for two years

A savings goal isn't priced today — it's priced on the day you'll actually pay. If the quote rises with inflation, grow it to that date, and remember inflation compounds: two years at 8% is 1.08 × 1.08 = 1.1664, a 16.64% rise, not 16%.

So a 150,000 UAH kitchen two years out costs 150,000 × 1.1664 = 174,960 in the base case. Lower inflation, lower target (168,540 at 6%); higher inflation, higher target (188,160 at 12%).

This grown-up number is the bar every savings option must clear. Comparing options against today's 150,000 would flatter all of them; the honest test is against what the bill will be when it arrives.

A deposit renewed for a second year earns interest on last year's interest too: that is compounding. And the rate that compounds is the one after tax, not the headline.

Dana's deposit: 14% before tax is 14% × 0.77 = 10.78% after tax. Year one: 150,000 × 1.1078 = 166,170. Year two: 166,170 × 1.1078 = 184,083 (that is 150,000 × 1.1078²).

That clears the base-case kitchen (174,960) with 9,123 to spare, but not the rough one (188,160). Two lessons stack here: always compound the after-tax rate, never the ad rate, and always measure the result against the goal priced at the same date, because both the savings and the bill grow over the two years.

For a bill that will come in hryvnias, dollars do not protect the goal — they turn it into a bet on the exchange rate. Dana's 150,000 buys 3,318.58 USD, grows to 3,554.95 in dollar bonds, and converts back at whatever the rate is in 2028.

At 46 it's 163,528 (short of even the calm kitchen); at 49, 174,193 (767 short of the base kitchen); at 56, 199,077 — finally enough, yet still below the hryvnia bonds' 201,840. The dollar would have to climb past about 56.8 just to match the hryvnia bonds.

So the dollar route wins only if the hryvnia falls hard, and even then it comes second here. Dollars earn their place when the bill is in dollars or genuinely unknown (an emergency fund), not for a hryvnia kitchen with a known date.

Putting everything into hryvnia government bonds can be a good plan, but a results table hides conditions that decide whether it works:

• Maturity vs the goal date. The bonds should mature before the builders start in autumn 2028; a mismatch forces an early sale.
• Early sale at market price. If she needs the money sooner, she sells at today's price, which can be below what she paid.
• No fund guarantee. Bonds are the state's own debt, not a bank deposit, so the Deposit Guarantee Fund doesn't cover them.

Two things that sound like risks are not: interest on government bonds isn't taxed, and hryvnia bonds repay hryvnias, so the dollar rate doesn't change the amount at maturity. Judge a plan by the conditions that truly apply to it, not by the scary-sounding ones that don't.