Tag Archives: banking

Business comment: Commodity slump hits richest

MARCH 4 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) — “Net worth” might not be hard data, but it’s still a decent indication of just how hard the economic downturn and the fall in commodity prices have hit Kazakhstan.

The owners of Kazakh miner ENRC lost a total of $1.8b in net worth in 2015, according to Forbes’ 2016 Billionaires list, showing the economic collapse that has hit Kazakhstan.

Aleksander Machkevich, Patok Chodiev and Alijan Ibragimov, the “Kazakh Trio,” lost around $600m each in 2015.

ENRC de-listed in London in November 2013 after disputes in the board and fraud investigations. The Kazakh Trio owns Eurasian Resources Group, a Luxembourg- based holding that owns ENRC.

Mr Ibragimov is the only member of the Trio registered in Kazakhstan.

Other members of the exclusive Kazakh billionaire club who have seen their fortunes dip include Dinara Kulibayeva, President Nursultan Nazarbayev’s daughter, and her husband Timur Kulibayev, each valued at $2b in 2015, down from a valuation of $2.1b in 2014.

Kazakhstan’s richest man, Bulat Utemuratov, fell 57 places in Forbes’ ranking. Mr Utemuratov is now the 771st richest man in the world, at $2.3b.

Finally, Forbes said that Vladimir Kim, who owns one-third of KAZ Minerals, saw his net worth decline from $1.8b to $1.5b.

Overall, the top five business people in Kazakhstan are worth $1.5b less than last year, that’s a 14% cut.

If the depreciation of the tenge has badly hit ordinary consumers and savers in Kazakhstan, the commodity slump remains the biggest headache for the high-flying business people.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 270, published on March 4 2016)

Uzbekistan suspends Khamkorbank

FEB. 16 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) – Uzbekistan’s Central Bank said it had suspended commercial lender Khamkorbank’s licence to trade in foreign currencies for six months due to unspecified violations of banking rules. The World Bank’s IFC and the Netherlands’ state-owned FMO both own stakes in Khamkorbank, 14.5% and 15% respectively.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 268, published on Feb. 19 2016)

Azerbaijani bank declares bancruptcy

FEB. 8 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) – Texnikabank became the fourth commercial bank in Azerbaijan to declare bankruptcy since the Central Bank started to withdraw licences from those banks it considers to be too small or weak. The Central Bank has previously said that people with savings of up to 30,000 manat ($19,000) will be fully compensated if their savings bank goes bankrupt. In January, Azerbaijan withdrew the licence for at least eight banks to operate because they fell below the required minimum capitalisation limit. Those banks have been choosing whether to merge or to go bankrupt since then.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 267, published on Feb. 12 2016)

Stock market: Bank of Georgia, Tethys, Centerra

FEB. 5 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) — Bank of Georgia shares were up 6.9% this week, closing at £18.14 on Thursday. The bank has followed a downward trend since the beginning of the year, but news of the merger between its corporate banking and investment management departments lifted its shares.

BGEO Group, the holding that owns Bank of Georgia, said it is confident that the move will boost returns and reduce risk.

Tethys Petroleum shares jumped by 19.7% to 2.25p off the back of stable oil prices, leading an upbeat crowd of oil and gas companies involved in the region. Only Nostrum continued the slump.

Among miners, Centerra Gold posted a significant jump of 7.2% to 6.73 Canadian dollars after the Mongolian parliament unblocked negotiations over ownership and licences linked to one of their gold mines in the north of the country.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 266, published on Feb. 5 2016)

Kazakh bank sells shares

FEB. 5 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) — Kazkommertsbank, one of Kaza- khstan’s largest lenders, said it sold the 99.4% stake it owned in BTA Bank to Kenes Rakishev, Nurzhan Subkhanberdin and other minority shareholders. The total cost of the transaction amounted to around 6.1m tenge ($16,200). Mr Rakishev and Mr Subkhanberdin now each own 49.18% in BTA. Both are also major shareholders in Kazkommertsbank.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 266, published on Feb. 5 2016)

Kazakh mortgage holders protest

FEB. 2 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) – Around 50 mortgage holders protested in Almaty because they said it was not possible to repay their debt after a devaluation of the tenge. This was the third protest by mortgage holders against banks this year, a rare sustained level of public discontent in Kazakhstan. The tenge has lost around 50% of its value. Last year, the Kazakh government gave banks $130m to refinance mortgages but protesters have said that more needs to be done. Analysts have said that one of the biggest issues the Kazakh government faces is growing consumer debt.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 266, published on Feb. 5 2016)

Azerbaijan revokes another banking licence

FEB. 2 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) — Azerbaijan’s Central Bank revoked the licence of Texnikabank, one of the country’s largest lenders, and handed back a licence to NBCBank after it said it was looking at a possible merger with a bigger rival.

The moves are part of a wider plan by the Azerbaijani Central Bank to tighten and strengthen Azerbaijan’s commercial banking sector.

The Central Bank said Texnikabank, one of Azerbaijan’s 10 largest banks by assets, did not comply with the minimum capital requirement of 50m manat ($31.3) and the capital adequacy ratio. Texnikabank became the seventh bank in Azerbaijan to lose its licence in the past few weeks.

It later handed NBCBank back its licence after it said that it had entered into negotiations with KredoBank and ParaBank about a possible merger.

Another commercial bank, Caucasus Development Bank, said it intends to merge with Gunay Bank and Atrabank.

Azerbaijan is trying to deal with the fallout from a sharp drop in the price of oil, its main export. This has hit its economy and its currency, the manat, putting increasing pressure on the banking sector.

There are currently 37 commercial banks operating in Azerbaijan.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 266, published on Feb. 5 2016)

Business comment: Central Bank intrigue in Kazakhstan

FEB. 5 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) — In Kazakhstan, the Central Bank resumed its work as the country’s financial regulator after a three-month hiatus, increasing interest rates by 1 percentage point to 17%.

Daniyar Akishev, the Central Banker, is at the helm again, it seems. He even ordered a handful of interventions in the currency market in January, something he had ruled out since his appointment last November.

Now, Kazakhstan watchers expect monetary policy to become more stable and predictable in the coming months. The next policy meeting will be held in six weeks, one week before a parliamentary election on March 20.

Still, many don’t see Mr Akishev’s position as an independent one. He is a seasoned Central Bank employee, but it is clear that he is not as free as many Western Central Bankers are.

A recent symbolic move could corroborate this view. This week, Kazakhstan’s President Nursultan Nazarbayev signed a decree that makes the Central Banker’s signature on the back of banknotes redundant.

Only eagles, monuments and the President’s handprint will continue to feature in Kazakhstan’s colourful currency.

The Central Banker’s signature is a convention that most countries in the world adopt.

Kazakhstan will now join a handful of countries that don’t feature their Central Banker’s signature on banknotes. This group includes China, Japan and Uzbekistan.

This might be, essentially, a final step by the Kazakh government to strip the Central Bank of the independence it gained under former governor Grigory Marchenko who left in 2013.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 266, published on Feb. 5 2016)

Azerbaijan Central Bank closes banks which fail capital stress test

JAN. 27 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) — Azerbaijan’s Central Bank stripped six banks of their licences because they failed to meet newly imposed minimum capital requirements, a strong signal that the authorities want to weed out weaker banks to try to fend off a deepening financial crisis.

The six banks — Ganja Bank, Bank of Azerbaijan, United Credit Bank, NBC Bank, Caucasian Development Bank and Atrabank — all lost their licences in the past 10 days. This leaves just over 30 banks operating in Azerbaijan.

“Banks that don’t meet requirements and have major shortcomings can’t operate in Azerbaijan,” President Ilham Aliyev said in a televised statement, hinting at more closures.

In mid-2012, Azerbaijan’s Central Bank increased by five times the minimum capital requirements for commercial banks from 10m manat to 50m manat (then around $64m, now $31.3m). The deadline for all banks in the country to comply with the new requirements was first set for 2013 and then delayed to end-2015.

For banks, one way to avoid closure and improve financial health is to unite. AGBank and DemirBank signed a protocol to merge last week and Pasha Bank, Kapital Bank and Atabank are in talks to create a single lender, according to Bloomberg.

Last week, ratings agency Moody’s downgraded several of the biggest banks in Azerbaijan, a direct consequence of the negative impact of the manat depreciation. Three of Azerbaijan’s top-10 banks, Xalq Bank, Bank of Baku and Unibank, were among the lenders on Moody’s radar.

With the Azerbaijani manat falling by 35% since Dec. 21, this is a particularly tough time for Azerbaijan’s banking sector and for ordinary people. The IMF has also flown into Baku to potentially offer a loan.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 265, published on Jan. 29 2016)

Business comment: Tough times for banks

JAN. 29 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) — Government policies towards the banking sector are key to survival during tough economic times.

In this new downturn, which has already lasted longer than the 2008/9 Financial Crisis, commodity prices have collapsed, hitting oil- exporting countries.

Kazakhstan and Azerbaijan have been among the hardest-hit economies in the South Caucasus and Central Asia.

In mid-2014, Kazakhstan planned to restructure its banking sector by imposing greater capital requirements. The Central Bank wanted the country’s banks to

increase their capital from 10b to 100b tenge ($54m to $543m at the time).

But in August 2015 the Central Bank abandoned the tenge peg to the US dollar, allowing it to fall sharply.

This relieved pressure on its currency but knocked plans to increase capital requirements for banks.

Bank deposits in Kazakhstan are now insured by the government. If the Central Bank had pushed forward with its new capitalisation plan after ditching the tenge-US dollar peg it would have meant that smaller banks would have had to close. The government would then have been under pressure to repay customers who had lost savings. Kazakh officials dodged this by scrapping the plan.

Azerbaijan, by contrast, has pushed ahead with increasing capital requirements at banks despite a 35% fall in its currency over the past month. This has forced small banks to close and larger banks to merge.

All this before introducing universal insurance on deposits. Until now, only savers with up to 30,000 manat ($18,400) were insured.

Time will tell which of the two strategies pays off.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 265, published on Jan. 29 2016)