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Rout on commodities-based companies hits KAZ Minerals

ALMATY, SEPT. 30 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) — KAZ Minerals’ shares in London lost a fifth of their value over the past week as concerns about future commodities prices continued to stalk the market and copper prices fell to near 6-year lows.

Globally, Switzerland-based Glencore was the biggest loser in September with around $14b wiped off its market cap. The market pushed down Glencore shares mainly because of worries over its large debt pile but the sell-off still pressured other commodities-orientated companies including miners in the South Caucasus and Central Asia.

And the drop in commodities prices it also a sovereign issue in Central Asia and the South Caucasus with national budgets partially reliant on income from sales. This will hurt Kazakhstan in particular, although it will reverberate across the region.

Analysts were quick to point the finger at weak Chinese demand for commodities, especially copper, for the drop in prices. Copper is regarded as a good conductor of electricity and heat and used widely in manufacturing.

“With China slowing down and a lot of uncertainty, fears in the market have intensified, and the reduction in the pace of demand growth for all commodities has seemed to send everybody off the cliff,” Ed Hirs, professor of energy economics at the University of Houston told Bloomberg.

China uses more than half of world’s copper production and any fluctuation in its demand curve has significant effects in the markets. A strong US dollar and uncertainty over Fed interest rate decisions has also hit commodities prices.

London-listed KAZ Minerals, formerly known as Kazakhmys, is particularly exposed to Chinese copper demand whims. Its main product is copper and China is one of its main clients.

Shares in KAZ Minerals were down 20.5% in one week closing at 84.65p, its lowest ever price. It later rebounded above 90p, due to a wave of short-term rebounds across the sector.

KAZ Minerals/Kazakhmys has been portrayed as a company closely interlinked with the elite in Kazakhstan.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 250, published on Oct. 2 2015)

Kazakh Central Bank raises interest rates

ALMATY, OCT. 2 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) — Kazakhstan’s Central Bank raised its new key interest rate to 16% from 12% in an attempt to contain rising inflation.

The increase in the overnight repo rate, made the key interest rate in September, highlights how heavily the Central Bank underestimated the rate that inflation would rise after a devaluation of its tenge currency in August. The tenge is now trading at 272/$1 compared to 188/$1 before it was cut from its US dollar peg on Aug, 20.

“Considering the economic data and prospects for growth the National Bank decided to raise its key interest rate to 16% to keep inflation in the medium-term target range of 6-8%,” the Central Bank said in a statement.

But bolstering the strength of the tenge may have been the Kazakh Central Bank’s main objective for the interest rate rise. Despite promising not to intervene in the currency markets after ditching the US dollar peg, the Kazakh Central Bank has spent $1b propping up its currency and keeping it away from the 300/$1 floor that it has threatened to fall through.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 250, published on Oct. 2 2015)

Despite promises, oil output falls in Azerbaijan

SEPT. 30 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) – Azerbaijan’s oil production fell by 3.1% between January and August this year compared to the same period in 2014, a source at the state’s Statistics Committee told Reuters, more bad news for the government as it tries to work out a strategy to deal with a regional economic downturn.

Oil exports are the mainstay of the Azerbaijan economy, and a collapse in oil prices over the past year has hit it hard.

It has cut government projects, slashed the value of its currency by a third and warned of low growth rates for the next couple of years.

Alongside the decline in revenue earned from exports, Azerbaijan is also dealing with a drop in production. This drop is mainly linked to a slowdown in production at the Azeri-Chirag-Guneshli (ACG) fields which are operated by BP.

The source told Reuters that Azerbaijan had produced 22.1m tonnes of oil in the first eight months of the year compared to 22.8m tonnes in 2014.

BP has tried to increase outflows from ACG over the past couple of years but without success, drawing criticism from Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 250, published on Oct. 2 2015)

Hotel prices in Azerbaijan’s capital slash

SEPT. 28 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) — In an effort to prop up the tourism industry, Abulfas Garayev, Azerbaijan’s minister of culture and tourism forced a number of hotels to reduce prices, local media reported. Baku invested heavily in new hotels ahead of hosting the European Games earlier this year. “Artificially inflated prices were reduced after a ministerial inspection. Prices have been reduced by about 10-15%,” media quoted Mr Garayev as saying.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 250, published on Oct. 2 2015)

Cell repays loan to Kazakh banks

SEPT. 28 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) — Kcell, one of the biggest players in Kazakhstan’s telecoms market, appears to re-organising its debt. It repaid a syndicated loan worth 14.8b tenge ($55m) to Citibank Kazakhstan and RBS Kazakhstan, days after opening a 17b credit line with Kazkommertsbank. Sweden- based TeliaSonera owns 62% of Kcell. It said last month that it wants to quit Eurasian markets.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 250, published on Oct. 2 2015)

Georgia joins Nato force

SEPT. 29 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) – Keen to further burnish its Western orientated credentials, Georgia said it would sign up to the NATO Response Force (NRF). Georgian PM Iraki Garibashvili said that Georgia would create a unit of 100 soldiers for the force which is designed to deploy rapidly to protect NATO members. Finland, Sweden and Ukraine are other non-NATO NRF members.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 250, published on Oct. 2 2015)

GDP growth slows for Georgia

SEPT. 30 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) – Preliminary GDP data for August showed that growth in Georgia measured 2.3% compared to the same month in 2014, the Georgia statistics agency said. This was the slowest year-on-year GDP growth since May.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 250, published on Oct. 2 2015)

OPEC asks Kazakhstan for oil cut

SEPT. 30 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) – Vladimir Shkolnik, the Kazakh energy minister, said OPEC members asked Kazakhstan to cut its oil production in a coordinated attempt to increase oil prices. Kazakhstan has said oil production would be slightly lower this year.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 250, published on Oct. 2 2015)

Uzbekistan boosts cotton appeal

OCT. 1 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) – Looking to boost the popular appeal of picking cotton, the authorities in Uzbekistan pulled in an actor and a singer for a photo op of them working in fields, the US-funded Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty reported. Uzbekistan’s cotton picking programme has drawn criticism from human rights groups.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 250, published on Oct. 2 2015)

Turkmen President stops-off in Munich

SEPT. 27 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) – A website run by Turkmen opposition activists living in exile said the plane belonging to Turkmen President Kurbanguly Berdymukhamedov had stopped off in Munich on its way to New York for the UN General Assembly meeting. The website speculated that he may have stopped off to visit a personal doctor.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 250, published on Oct. 2 2015)