Tag Archives: Kazakhstan

Teachers in Kazakhstan to receive 50% pay rise

SEPT. 8 2015, ALMATY (The Conway Bulletin) — Kazakhstan’s government said that it would increase salaries for teachers by 20-50% depending on their qualifications, another indication that the devaluation of the tenge is spurring inflation.

Announcing the pay rise at a school in Astana, deputy PM Berdybek Saparbayev said that it showed the government cared about its workers. “We have very good news for our teachers,” media quoted him as saying. “Salaries will be increased from 20 to 50% starting from 2016.”

The Kazakh Central Bank has devalued the tenge twice since February 2014.

It is now worth around 40% less than it was before the first devaluation and economists have been warning that inflation will shoot up.

Companies have already been raising salaries and it was only a matter of time before the government put up pay for its thousands of employees.

Other key workers, such as doctors and nurses, have also been promised large tenge pay rises.

The problem for the Kazakh government is that with oil prices low and production declining, it may struggle to pay or all the rises.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 247, published on Sept. 11 2015)

Currency: Kyrgyz som, Kazakh tenge

SEPT. 11 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) — The Kazakh tenge and the Kyrgyz som dropped to record lows this week, as economies in Central Asia and the South Caucasus continued to show structural weaknesses.

By the end of Friday, the tenge traded at around 264/$1, down from 240/$1 at the start of the week. That’s a drop of 10%. The Kyrgyz som fared slightly better but still dropped through the 67/$1 barrier. A week earlier it had traded at around 65.5/$1.

Over the border in Tajikistan, the somoni held its own. This may have had something to do with a massive cash injection from China. It agreed to buy 3b yuan ($470m) worth of somoni in a so called currency swap deal. This is a thinly disguised mechanism to prop up the ailing somoni which has lost 17% of its value this year.

In the South Caucasus the currencies were broadly stable, although the Georgian lari lost some ground, falling to around 2.40/$1 compared with a price of around 2.36/$1 a week earlier.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 247, published on Sept. 11 2015)

Kazakhstan to receive uranium bank investment

SEPT. 4 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) – US billionaire businessman Warren Buffett has pledged $50m for Kazakhstan’s new low-enriched uranium bank, media reported quoting The Economist. The concept behind the uranium bank is that it will be able to control the flow of lightly enriched uranium to countries for nuclear power stations.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 247, published on Sept. 11 2015)

Moody downgrades Kazakh banks

SEPT. 7 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) — Moody’s ratings agency downgraded three Kazakh banks due to their deteriorating asset quality and their exposure to foreign currency lending. Kazkommertsbank’s baseline credit assessment (BCA) was rated caa2, ATF Bank fell to caa3, and Eurasian Bank was downgraded to caa1. Moody’s also changed the outlook of the three Kazakh lenders, together with Halyk Bank, to negative, highlighting the precarious state of Kazakhstan’s banking sector.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 247, published on Sept. 11 2015)

Irish Siteserv enters Kazakhstan

SEPT. 8 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) — Irish industrial services company Deborah Services Limited (DSL) and Lancaster Group, a Kazakh private holding company, signed a multi-million euro agreement to form a joint venture to serve oil and gas operations in Kazakhstan. Infrastructure and utility support firm Siteserv owns DSL. The new company, DSL Caspian, will provide protective coatings and fire protection at onshore and offshore oilfields in Kazakhstan. Lancaster Group is closely linked to the Kazakh elite. Yerbolat Dossayev, currently minister of economic development, is a major stakeholder in the group.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 247, published on Sept. 11 2015)

Kazakh president appoints Dariga to be deputy PM

SEPT. 11 2015, ALMATY (The Conway Bulletin) — Kazakh president Nursultan Nazarbayev appointed his daughter, Dariga Nazarbayeva, to be a deputy PM, triggering an avalanche of speculation that she was being lined up to succeed him.

The appointment caps a remarkable turnaround for Ms Nazarbayeva who in 2007 fell out with her father and was forced to relinquish her seat in parliament and her media business interests.

Analysts said that her appointment as deputy PM was significant.

“It does look like a sign of succession,” Nargis Kassenova, professor of International Relations at KIMEP University in Almaty.

“Now with no danger of Rakhat Aliyev coming back, there seems to be no serious constraint to keep her away from top executive positions.”

Ms Nazarbayeva had been married to Rakhat Aliyev who fled into exile in 2007 and set himself up in opposition to President Nazarbayev. He was later arrested and charged in Vienna with murdering two Kazakh bankers outside Almaty.

Mr Nazarbayev had wanted him extradited but this year, the day before he was to stand trial, Aliyev was found hanged in his prison cell.

The succession issue for President Nazarbayev has become one of his most pressing. The 75-year-old, who has ruled over Kazakhstan since its independence from the Soviet Union in 1991, has not yet named a successor, which has allowed rumours to swirl and instability to take root.

Ms Kassenova, the KIMEP professor, said that Ms Nazarbayeva’s promotion may already have been trailed when President Nazarbayev earlier this month spoke about the Asian model of democracy.

“This dynastic approach to power is probably what President Nazarbayev had in mind when he recently referred to our Asian traditions to explain a slow move to Western-style democracy,” she said.

Ms Nazarbayeva returned to parliament in the 2012 election and has since held the position of deputy speaker of parliament.

There are other potential rivals for power. These include PM Karim Massimov, defence minister Imangali Tasmagambetov and Timur Kulibayev, the former head of Kazakhstan’s sovereign wealth fund and the husband of Mr Nazarbayev’s second daughter.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 247, published on Sept. 11 2015)

Kazakh police arrests Kostanai governor

SEPT. 8 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) – Police arrested the governor of the Kostanai region in north Kazakhstan, Akhmetbek Akhmetzhanov, for corruption. Kazakh officials have arrested a handful of senior regional officials over the past year or so for corruption.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 247, published on Sept. 11 2015)

Kazakh national wants to be football chief

SEPT. 8 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) – Aisultan Nazarbayev, grandson of Kazakh president Nursultan Nazarbayev, has said he wants to be head of Kazakhstan’s football association. Mr Nazarbayev is already head of the club that owns FC Astana which has qualified for the UEFA Champions League.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 247, published on Sept. 11 2015)

Markets: Central Bank reserves in Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan and Azerbaijan

SEPT. 9 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) — Perhaps the most important feature of news and data from the region’s money markets this week was details about the various Central Banks’ gold and currency reserves.

Kazakhstan’s Central Bank said it had increased its reserves in August to $29.1b. Kazakhstan has amassed reserves over the past 3 months after spending around $400m in April to contain the effects of the regional financial crisis.

In Kyrgyzstan, the Central Bank’s reserves hit $2b, according to the Central Bank, back up to the levels of August 2014.

In Baku it was another story. The Central Bank has been spending ferociously since it devalued its manat currency by a third in February. According to the state-linked Trend news agency, the Azerbaijani Central Bank spent 14% of its foreign currency reserves in August. In the last year, Azerbaijan has spent half its foreign currency reserves trying to defend the manat.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 247, published on Sept. 11 2015)

Stock market: KAZ Minerals, Roxi, Centerra

SEPT. 11 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) — The biggest movers on the stock markets were copper producer KAZ Minerals which finished the week up 8%, Roxi Petroleum settled down 12% and Centerra Gold fell by 6.6%.

KAZ Minerals’ share price has fluctuated wildly, hit by China’s economic health and commodity prices. It is now trading at 162 pence, up from around 150 pence at the start of the week. It is sensitive to the value of the tenge which weakened by 10% this week and gave KAZ Minerals a lift.

Roxi Petroleum’s main oil assets are in Kazakhstan.

Its shares fell after it said it was having to downgrade the value of its assets by 28% in line with the fall in the tenge last month.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 247, published on Sept. 11 2015)