JAN. 18 (The Conway Bulletin) — Uzbek President Shavkat Mirziyoyev ordered a joint Uzbek-Emirati investment company to be set up. The fund, according to reports, will have a working capital of $1b and will be 75% owned by the Abu Dhabi Development Fund, and 25% owned by the Uzbek Fund for Reconstruction and Development.
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>>This story was first published in issue 397 of The Conway Bulletin on Jan. 20 2019
LONDON/JAN.15 (The Conway Bulletin) — – Azerbaijan-based gold producer Anglo Asian, which is listed on the London Stock Exchange, posted weak fourth quarter results but said that its overall performance in 2018 had been good.
Output in the three months to the end of December fell to 21,945 ounces of gold equivalent compared to 23,185 ounces in the same period in 2017 and dented what had been a spectacular year.
In September, Anglo Asian’s share price began to rise from 42.5p after the first of a series of positive trading updates and an inaugural dividend announcement.
By Dec. 4 it had peaked at 95.5p. It lost 5% after Tuesday’s announcement that Q4 had been worse than expected, triggering a drop of 5%.
Even so, total production in 2018 rose to 83,736 ounces, up 17% from 2017. This was at the top end of its guidance range.
In his commentary, Anglo Asian CEO Reza Vaziri concentrated on the full year results.
“In addition to increasing production from the previous year, Anglo Asian has also significantly strengthened its balance sheet and paid a maiden dividend, all of which has bolstered Anglo Asian’s value and investment profile,” he said.
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>>This story was first published in issue 397 of The Conway Bulletin on Jan. 20 2019
MOSCOW+ALMATY/JAN. 11 (The Conway Bulletin) — — A court in Moscow approved the extradition of Kazakh businessman Zhomart Ertaev to Kazakhstan where he is wanted on charges of defrauding Bank RBK of $160m.
Mr Ertaev, who denies the allegations, had tried to claim asylum in Russia because he said that he would not receive a fair trial in Kazakhstan. Special forces police detained him in May in a high-profile swoop on his motorcade outside the Moskva-Citi business centre.
The extradition of Mr Ertaev highlights increased cooperation between the Russian and the Kazakh law enforcement agencies in tracking down and extraditing businessmen wanted for various frauds. It also represents a change of heart by Russian officials who, in October had declined to extradite him.
Previously, Moscow had been viewed by wealthy Kazakhs fleeing from Kazakhstan as a useful stage post. Mukhtar Ablyazov, Kazakhstan’s most high-profile fugitive and President Nursultan Nazarbayev’s number one enemy fled to London via Moscow in 2008/9.
Mr Ertaev’s had left Kazakhstan in around 2009 after being released from detention. He had been tried for defrauding Alliance Bank, where he was the chairman in 2002-7, but was released because the judge said there wasn’t enough evidence against him.
Since then he appears to have lived for at least part of the time in Moscow where he became a director at Alma-TV and also chairman of Troyka-D Bank.
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>>This story was first published in issue 397 of The Conway Bulletin on Jan. 20 2019
JAN. 17 (The Conway Bulletin) — A helicopter crashed as it took over from the upmarket Alatau spa resort on the outskirts of Almaty in southern Kazakhstan, killing the pilot, media reported. According to the reports, only the pilot was aboard the helicopter when it crashed. The Eurocopter 130 belonged to Sky Service, a private charter company, and had been due to fly to the Big Almaty Lake, a popular beauty spot.
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>>This story was first published in issue 397 of The Conway Bulletin on Jan. 20 2019
JAN. 17 (The Conway Bulletin) — Fuel prices in Kyrgyzstan rose by over 10% in 2018, media reported by quoting the National Statistics Committee, far quicker than the average inflation rate of 4.5%. People in Kyrgyzstan are increasingly frustrated about jobs going to Chinese, and rising petrol prices will feed into this frustration. The National Statistics Agency also said that Kyrgyzstan’s GDP growth in 2018 had been 3.5%, roughly in-line with expectations.
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>>This story was first published in issue 397 of The Conway Bulletin on Jan. 20 2019
LONDON/JAN. 13 (The Conway Bulletin) — British police say they seized an 8.9 carat ring from a jeweller’s where it had been taken to be repaired. The ring, bought at Harrods in London in 2011, is one of the multi-million dollar assets that Zamira Hajiyeva, wife of jailed Azerbaijani banker Jahangir Hajiyev, has bought. She is the subject of Britain’s first unexplained wealth order.
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>>This story was first published in issue 397 of The Conway Bulletin on Jan. 20 2019
JAN. 17 (The Conway Bulletin) — The International Olympic Committee (IOC) stripped Georgian wrestler Davit Modzmanashvili of his silver medal at the London 2012 Olympics because he failed doping tests. The IOC is re-testing urine and blood samples taken from the 2012 Olympics using the latest methods. Since 2017, Mr Modzmanashvili has represented Uzbekistan. He won a gold medal at the 2018 Asian Championships in Bishkek.
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>>This story was first published in issue 397 of The Conway Bulletin on Jan. 20 2019
JAN. 17 (The Conway Bulletin) — New York-listed telecoms firm Veon which operates the Beeline brand appointed Evgeniy Nastradin to be the new CEO of its Kazakh operations. Mr Nastradin had previously been Beeline Kazakhstan’s COO. He replaces Aleksandr Komarov who moves to Veon’s brand in Ukraine, Kyivstar.
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>>This story was first published in issue 397 of The Conway Bulletin on Jan. 20 2019
TBILISI/JAN. 9 (The Conway Bulletin) — Georgia’s Prosecutor-General confirmed that it had launched a money laundering investigation focused on a handful of transactions by the chairman and deputy chairman of London-listed TBC Bank in 2008.
It said that Mamuka Khazaradze, the TBC chairman, and Bardi Japaridze, the deputy chairman, took a $17m unsecured loan from TBC through two shell companies, Samgori Trade LLC and Samgori M LLC, which was promptly written off by the Bank and has never been repaid.
The investigation was ongoing, the Prosecutor-General said, but also that in an earlier investigation Georgia’s Financial Monitoring Service had “arrived at the conclusion that activities clearly showed the characteristics of legalisation of illegal income, i.e. money laundering, and other illicit acts.”
TBC Bank has denied any wrongdoing and said that the Central Bank investigated these transactions in 2008 and passed them off as transparent.
“We hereby categorically deny the false accusations and misleading information carefully orchestrated by the forces behind the dark PR,” TBC said.
Some allies of Mr Khazaradze said that Bidzina Ivanishvili, Georgia’s richest man and the owner of a rival bank, may be trying to discredit him.
TBC Bank is the largest retail bank in Georgia with a 38% of the loan market. Its shares fell by 5% on news of the investigation to 1,408p.
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>>This story was first published in issue 397 of The Conway Bulletin on Jan. 20 2019
TBILISI/JAN. 11 (The Conway Bulletin) — Azerbaijan has become the first foreign buyer of Israel’s so-called suicide drone, the Jerusalem Post reported. Relations between Azerbaijan and Israel have blossomed in recent years with Israel buying Azerbaijan oil and gas and Azerbaijan buying Israeli weapons. Azerbaijan is still officially at war with Armenia over the disputed region of Nagorno-Karabakh.
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>>This story was first published in issue 397 of The Conway Bulletin on Jan. 20 2019