Tag Archives: Azerbaijan

Finance deals for Azerbaijani banks

JULY 25 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) – Azerbaijani finance looks in good shape.

At a local finance level, the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD) has handed a $42m loan to Demirbank earmarked to help smaller businesses raise funds.

At an international level, Citi Group said it is now selling more Azerbaijani debt than at any time since 2008.

Both pieces of news are good general indicators for the Azerbaijani economy. Most analysts agree that the economy is in pretty good shape although domestic consumer lending needs to be tapered.

Bloomberg quoted Citi Group as saying that it had debuted nearly $15m of debt for Kapital Bank having issued $38.5m of debt for the International Bank of Azerbaijan earlier this year.

“Investors are seeking risk in emerging markets as central bank stimulus measures suppress returns on debt issued by companies in developed nations,” Bloomberg wrote.

Even so, the yield on the Azerbaijani bank debt is high at nearly 9%, reflecting the risk involved.

The Demirbank deal is more the culmination of a long term project by the EBRD to improve access to finance for smaller businesses in Azerbaijan. In April AccessBank, another Azerbaijani bank, secured a $60m loan from 16 lenders also for micro-finance.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 193, published on July 30 2014)

Azerbaijan’s oil output continues to fall

JULY 21 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) – Azerbaijan’s oil output has continued to fall in 2014 despite attempts by BP, the country’s biggest foreign investor, to stem the decline. Reuters quoted a source in the Azerbaijani statistics department as saying that output was down 2.8% in the first six months of the year.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 193, published on July 30 2014)

Religious tension rising in Azerbaijan

JULY 8 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) – In rural Azerbaijan religious violence has increased because of extremism in Syria and Iraq, eurasianet.org reported. It said that in a village a group of Shi’a Muslims shaved the beard of a Sunni man. The next day Sunni Muslims attacked Shi’a group.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 192, published on July 9 2014)

OSCE media criticises Azerbaijan

JULY 8 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) – The Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) criticised Azerbaijan for giving two bloggers prison sentences this yea. OSCE media chief Dunja Mijatovic said: “The list of individuals imprisoned in Azerbaijan for exercising their right to free speech is growing very rapidly.”

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 192, published on July 9 2014)

Azerbaijan using aggressive language near Nagorno-Karabakh

JULY 7 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) – Azerbaijan appears to be ramping up the pressure on Armenia over the disputed region of Nagorno-Karabakh by holding a series of high profile military exercises along the border.

Armenian backed rebels have held Nagorno-Karabakh since a 1994 UN negotiated cease-fire but barely a week goes by without reports of isolated shootouts and casualties. Over the past decade, as Azerbaijan have become increasingly rich from oil and gas, it has also built up its weapons systems and military.

And increasingly bellicose language about war with Armenia has built up.

“Servicemen shouldn’t forget that 20 percent of the Azerbaijan’s territories are under occupation and the main task is to free these lands from invasion,” Azerbaijani Defense Minister Colonel-General Zakir Hasanov said at a ceremony to honour the militar earlier this month.

This 20% is Nagorno-Karbakh and adjacent regions.

Europe’s peace monitoring watchdog, the Organisation for Cooperation and Secutriy in Europe (OSCE) has consistently called the dispute over Nagorno-Karabakh the most dangerous of the South Caucasus’ frozen conflicts.

Azerbaijani media reported that 10,000 soldiers, 300 armoured vehicles, 100 artillery pieces, 20 aircraft and 15 air defence pieces were taking part in the 3-day exercise.

This exercise is certainly large but it needs to understood in context. Earlier this year, Azerbaijan mobilised 20,000 soldiers for an exercise on the border.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 192, published on July 9 2014)

Azerbaijan’s monetary base grows

JULY 4 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) – Azerbaijan’s monetary base has grown by 11.5% in the past year, media reported quoting the Central Bank. Measuring a country’s monetary base is important to evaluate its financial stability.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 192, published on July 9 2014)

Azerbaijan’s housing market booms

JULY 1 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) – Azerbaijan’s housing market grew by 27% in the first five months of the year compared to the same period in 2013, media reported quoting the Central Bank. The data is another sign that Azerbaijan’s economy may be overheating.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 190, published on July 2 2014)

Azerbaijan’s museum wins UK architecture award

JUNE 30 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) – Baku’s newly built Heydar Aliyev Centre, likened to a whirl of whipped cream, won the prestigious British Design Museum’s “Design of the Year” award for its iconic shape and feel.

The award is a triumph for Baku on a civic scale. It has worked hard to transform itself into a modern city. Millions of dollars of oil cash has been spent on beautifying the city and this means building iconic structures.

The Heydar Aliyev building is just one example of the city’s ambitious rebuilding project — others include the three feline 190m-high Flame Towers and the sparkling Crystal Hall that hosted the 2012 Eurovision contest — and its curves certainly leave an impression.

“It is an intoxicatingly beautiful building by the most brilliant architect at the height of her office’s powers,” the Guardian quoted juror Piers Gough, of CZWG Architects, as saying.

“It is as pure and sexy as Marilyn’s blown skirt.”

But as with most of Baku’s architectural accolades, and it has attracted a reasonable bag, they come with criticism of Azerbaijan’s human rights record.

Human Rights Watch and other lobby groups criticised the Design Museum for honouring a country whose record on free speech has been worsening. They said that Dame Zaha Hadid, the Iraqi-born Britain-based architect of the museum, should use her award to promote human rights.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 190, published on July 2 2014)

Azerbaijan’s media freedom cracks

JUNE 26 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) – Media lobby group Reporters Without Borders accused Azerbaijan of sentencing opposition newspaper editor Hilal Mammadov to five years in jail on trumped-up charges of drug trafficking, inciting hatred and treason. Azerbaijan’s Supreme Court had the day before upheld a sentenced passed in September 2013 against Mammadov.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 190, published on July 2 2014)

Azerbaijan’s gas exports to Georgia rise

JULY 1 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) – Georgia has imported 20% more gas from Azerbaijan this year compared to the same period in 2013, media reported. This shows the increasing inter-dependency of the countries in the South Caucasus. Azerbaijan is Georgia’s largest gas supplier.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 190, published on July 2 2014)