MAY 20 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) — Bolat Nazarbayev, brother of Kazakhstan’s President Nursultan Nazarbayev, bought a 50% stake in the Ukrainian lender Eurobank. The remaining 50% of the bank is indirectly owned by Ukrainian financier Vadim Pushkarev. In 2014, Bolat Nazarbayev bought a 7.83% stake in Kazakhstan’s Bank RBK.
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(News report from Issue No. 282, published on May 27 2016)
MAY 23 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) — Azerbaijan’s state-owned railway company signed an agreement with German logistics giant DHL to establish a hub in Azerbaijan to service Turkey, Russia and Europe with goods coming from China. Azerbaijan Railways’ representative Nadir Azmammadov met with a DHL delegation in Istanbul.
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(News report from Issue No. 282, published on May 27 2016)
MAY 26 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) — The EBRD has loaned around €294m ($328m) to KazTransGas, Kazakhstan’s state-owned gas distributor, to finance the modernisation of a gas storage facility and a distribution network. This is the first time that the EBRD has invested into KazTransGas projects. Modernisation at the Bozoi gas storage facility, near the Aral Sea, will increase its capacity by 1.5 times to 4b cubic metres.
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(News report from Issue No. 282, published on May 27 2016)
MAY 23 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) — Russian energy company Lukoil said it had reached an agreement with the Uzbek government to improve the terms of its production sharing agreement (PSA) for the development of its oil fields at Kandym, Khauzak, Shady and Kungrad. Details of the new PSA were kept confidential. Lukoil had said that sustained low oil prices had made these projects more costly.
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(News report from Issue No. 282, published on May 27 2016)
MAY 25 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) — BP and Azerbaijan’s state-owned SOCAR signed a deal to jointly explore for oil in a new block at the offshore North Absheron Basin in the Caspian Sea, a sign that BP is taking a long-term approach to Azerbaijan despite the low global oil prices.
The North Absheron Basin is an oil field located just north of Baku. It should not be confused with the Absheron gas field located 100 km south of Baku and currently exploited by France’s Total and GDF Suez together with SOCAR. Absheron is the name of the peninsula where Baku is located.
SOCAR CEO Rovnag Abdullayev and BP’s regional representative Gordon Birrell said they were satisfied.
“Today we are signing a new memorandum of understanding which will lay the foundation of a new off- shore project. This will become another opportunity underpinning our long-term relationship with BP,” Mr Abdullayev said before Mr Birrell echoed his remarks.
Details on the deal are scant. Block D230 in the North Absheron Basin has a reservoir depth of 3,000-5,000 metres. It is still unclear just how much hydrocarbon resources it holds and how much both companies will have to invest to make it profitable.
The deal is also important in other respects. It allows SOCAR to reinforce its ties with BP, sharply criticised in the last few months by President Ilham Aliyev for failing to maintain oil and gas production.
The latest data showed that BP’s oil output was flat in the first quarter of 2016, compared to last year, while gas production grew by 3.8% to 2.7b cubic metres in the same period.
Sustained low oil prices over the past two years have taken a toll on SOCAR, which has embarked on a campaign to cut costs and sell off assets. SOCAR, though, appears ready to commit to new exploration ventures. Earlier this month it also agreed a deal with Uzbekistan.
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(News report from Issue No. 282, published on May 27 2016)
MAY 14 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) — Russian real estate holding Tashir Group opened a new $14m mall in Yerevan. Tashir Group, owned by Moscow-based Armenian businessman Samvel Karapetyan, has poured cash into several real estate projects in Armenia in the past few years. Last year, it bought the electricity distributor Electric Networks of Armenia from Russian state-owned Inter RAO.
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(News report from Issue No. 281, published on May 20 2016)
MAY 19 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) — Kazakhstan’s flagship carrier Air Astana said Mongolia’s aviation authority had withdrawn permission to open a direct flight from Astana to Ulaanbaatar in June. The company said that the Mongolian aviation authority did not give a reason for unilaterally withdrawing permission to fly. A spat with the Russian aviation authority over the use of airspace had previously delayed the launch of the link. Officially, Air Astana denied that the two incidents were related.
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(News report from Issue No. 281, published on May 20 2016)
MAY 18 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) – The World Bank said it would consider funding the modernisation of the Nurek hydropower plant in central Tajikistan. Located 70km east of Dushanbe, the 3,000 MW plant at Nurek produces around 70% of Tajikistan’s total electricity output. Earlier in May, Tajik President Emomali Rakhmon said it needs an investment of more than 4.7bn somoni (around $600m).
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(News report from Issue No. 281, published on May 20 2016)
MAY 16 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) – The Armenian ministry of agriculture sent a delegation to China to discuss a trade agreement aimed at opening the potentially lucrative Chinese market to alcoholic drinks from Armenia. Armenian wine exports tripled in volume between 2008 and 2014 and Armenian brandy is revered in the FSU. Last year, in a reflection of the current economic downturn, volumes fell by 31.5%.
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(News report from Issue No. 281, published on May 20 2016)
MAY 17 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) – Azerbaijan and Georgia sent a delegation to Greece for the groundbreaking ceremony of the Trans Adriatic Pipeline (TAP), part of a network of pipelines that will pump gas from the Caspian Sea to Europe, in a show of support for a project that the European Union considers vitally important.
Georgia’s PM Giorgi Kvirikashvili and Azerbaijan’s deputy PM Yagub Eyyubov attended the inauguration event with Greek Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras, European Commissioner Maroš Šefčovič and Special Envoy at the US State Department Amos Hochstein.
“Georgia, as a transit country, reiterates its commitments to the diversification of energy supplies to Europe and expresses supports for existing and future energy projects connected to the Southern Gas Corridor,” Mr Kvirikashvili said.
The so-called Southern Gas Corridor, a network of pipelines, is scheduled to be completed in 2019 and will send 16b cubic metres of gas to Europe every year.
TAP will ship 10b cubic metres from Greece’s border with Turkey across the Adriatic Sea to Italy. From there it will be pumped to central Europe.
Mr Kvirikashvili said the project “creates a new dimension for economic cooperation and for the security in the region.”
Azerbaijan is an integral part of the project. The Corridor’s pipelines will be filled with gas from its major fields, chiefly Shah Deniz.
Azerbaijan is also invested in the construction and management of the pipelines. SOCAR, the state energy company, owns 20% of TAP. BP (20%), Snam (20%), Fluxys (16%), Enagas (16%) and Axpo (5%) consti- tute the remaining shareholders.
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(News report from Issue No. 281, published on May 20 2016)