JAN. 21 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) — Brushing aside growing speculation over the Kazakh economy, Kairat Kelimbetov, head of Kazakhstan’s Central Bank, said there were no plans to devalue the Kazakh tenge. Media reports quoted Mr Kelimbetov after analysts openly questioned whether the tenge was too expensive.
ENDS
Copyright ©The Conway Bulletin — all rights reserved
(News report from Issue No. 168, published on Jan. 22 2014)
JAN. 13 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) — Tajikistan cut its key interest rate to a record low of 4.8% to combat falling inflation, media reported quoting the Central Bank. It previously cut the key interest rate to 5.5% in October 2013. Falling inflation, marking slower economic growth, is a major concern for Central Banks in the South Caucasus and Central Asia.
ENDS
Copyright ©The Conway Bulletin — all rights reserved
(News report from Issue No. 167, published on Jan. 15 2014)
JAN. 1 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) — Uzbekistan’s Central Bank cut its key interest rate to 10% from 12% to try and combat falling inflation, media reported. Uzbekistan’s interest rate had been 12% since January 2011. Analysts expect official inflation in Uzbekistan to fall in 2014 to around 6% from 7% in 2013.
ENDS
Copyright ©The Conway Bulletin — all rights reserved
(News report from Issue No. 166, published on Jan. 8 2014)
DEC. 5 2013 (The Conway Bulletin) — In an interview with Bloomberg News in London, Kazakhstan’s Central Bank chief Kairat Kelimbetov said one of his main objectives was to cut the proportion of nonperforming loans in Kazakh banks to 10% by January 2016. Non-performing loans currently make up about 30% of its banks’ portfolio.
ENDS
Copyright ©The Conway Bulletin — all rights reserved
(News report from Issue No. 164, published on Dec. 11 2013)
NOV. 15 2013 (The Conway Bulletin) — Kazakhstan’s new Central Bank chief, Kairat Kelimbetov, said he wanted to move the Bank to Astana from Almaty. Mr Kelimbetov replaced the independent-minded Grigory Marchenko as the Central Bank chief in October. Reports have said Kazakh President Nursultan Nazarbayev wants the Central Bank in Astana.
ENDS
Copyright ©The Conway Bulletin — all rights reserved
(News report from Issue No. 161, published on Nov. 20 2013)
OCT. 9 2013 (The Conway Bulletin) — If the outgoing Kazakh Central Bank chief Grigory Marchenko was an independent-minded career finance-man, Kairat Kelimbetov, the new one, could not be more different.
Mr Kelimbetov, 44, has instead picked a career path through the ranks of Kazakh officialdom based on efficiency and party loyalty. Now he has been thrust into the spotlight as the surprise choice of Kazakh President Nursultan Nazarbayev to replace Mr Marchenko.
Some say Mr Nazarbayev sacked Mr Marchenko, others that he resigned for family reasons. Whatever the reason, Mr Kelimbetov takes over a demanding brief. Mr Nazarbayev has said that he wants to unite Kazakhstan’s pension funds. There is also intensifying downward pressure on the tenge.
Mr Kelimbetov is the son of a well-known Kazakh academic. His peers are the group of Kazakhs in their mid-40s who are now assuming some of the top jobs. These include Timur Kulibayev, the president’s son-in-law.
He started his career at various government planning departments before becoming the minister of economy in 2002. That posting launched his career which began to carry the hallmarks of a favourite of Mr Nazarbayev.
Mr Kelimbetov was made a deputy head of Mr Nazarbayev’s Nur Otan political party in 2007 and for a few months in 2008 he was head of the presidential administration, a powerful position. In 2008, he took over as chairman of Kazakhstan’s sovereign wealth fund Samruk-Kazyna until 2012 when he became a deputy prime minister.
At each stage of his career, Mr Kelimbetov has parachuted into a role picked for him by Mr Nazarbayev. Heading the Central Bank is another important notch in his distinctive career resume.
ENDS
Copyright ©The Conway Bulletin — all rights reserved
(News report from Issue No. 155, published on Oct. 9 2013)
OCT. 1 2013 (The Conway Bulletin) — Kazakh President Nursultan Nazarbayev sacked the country’s long-serving Central Bank chief Grigory Marchenko in a surprise move that may sow doubt over Kazakhstan’s economic direction.
Former economy minister Kairat Kelimbetov will take over from Mr Marchenko.
Mr Nazarbayev didn’t give a clear reason for sacking Mr Marchenko, considered a favourite of investors. Mr Marchenko, 53, was brought in to head Kazakhstan’s Central Bank for a second time in 2009 to help weather the financial crisis. Under his leadership Kazakhstan nationalised a handful of banks that were teetering on the brink of collapse and devalued the tenge national currency.
Mr Marchenko won international plaudits and in 2011 was touted as a possible replacement for Dominique Strass- Kahn, the disgraced French politician, as head of the IMF.
More recently, Kazakhstan’s Central Bank has been grappling with downward pressure on the tenge and the reorganisation of the country’s pension funds.
Mr Nazarbayev may have just decided that it was time for a change and to replace the notoriously independent-minded Mr Marchenko with the more pliant Mr Kelimbetov.
ENDS
Copyright ©The Conway Bulletin — all rights reserved
(News report from Issue No. 154, published on Oct. 2 2013)
OCT. 1 2013 (The Conway Bulletin) — Kazakh President Nursultan Nazarbayev sacked his Central Bank chief, Grigory Marchenko. Mr Marchenko had been head of Kazakhstan’s central bank since 2009. Mr Nazrarbayev didn’t give a clear reason for sacking Mr Marchenko. Former economy minister Kairat Kelimbetov was named as the new Central Bank chief.
ENDS
Copyright ©The Conway Bulletin — all rights reserved
(News report from Issue No. 154, published on Oct. 2 2013)
AUG. 28 2013 (The Conway Bulletin) — Keen to strengthen control over the tenge, the Kazakh Central Bank switched from managing the value of its national currency against the dollar to using an aggregated basket of currencies.
The US dollar will still make up 70% of the new basket, Kazakh Central Bank chief Grigory Marchenko said, but the euro will also make up 20% and the Russian rouble 10%.
This system is more in line with a currency basket used by the Russian Central Bank to determine the value of the rouble.
In July, the Central Bank came under pressure to devalue the tenge after it dropped to 154 to the dollar. Since then it has rebounded to about 152 tenge to the dollar.
This currency basket will give the Kazakh Central Bank more room to intervene in the markets to defend the value of its currency. It scrapped a managed corridor value for the tenge in March 2011.
Two years earlier, in February 2009 during the global financial crisis, the Kazakh Central Bank devalued the tenge by 21%.
ENDS
Copyright ©The Conway Bulletin — all rights reserved
(News report from Issue No. 150, published on Sept. 2 2013)
JUNE 14 2013 (The Conway Bulletin) — Bloomberg News reported that Austrian prosecutors have accused nine bankers in Austria of bribing foreign bankers, including Adib Mayaleh, head of the Azerbaijani Central Bank. Mr Mayaleh denied he had taken a bribe. He has never been charged with corruption.
ENDS
Copyright ©The Conway Bulletin — all rights reserved
(News report from Issue No. 139, published on June 17 2013)