Tag Archives: Kazakhstan

Kazakhstan to start assembling helicopters from Russia

DEC. 15 2019 (The Bulletin) — Kazakhstan Engineering will begin assembling 17 Russian Mi-171 transport helicopters next year, the Kazakh government said in a statement. All 17 helicopters will be manufactured in Russia and will be bought by either Kazakhstan’s National Guard or its Emergencies Ministry. Kazakhstan Engineering described the deal as a “significant step in the development of Kazakhstan’s helicopter industry”.
ENDS

— This story was first published in issue 432 of the weekly Bulletin on Dec. 27 2019

Kazakhstan completes deal to buy power station from Russia

Leave a Reply

DEC. 12 2019 (The Bulletin) — Kazakhstan’s national wealth fund, Samruk Kazyna, completed a $25m deal to buy a 50% stake in the Ekibastuz power station-2, the largest power plant in the north of the country, that it didn’t already own from Russia’s Inter RAO. The coal-fired power station reportedly produces around 12% of Kazakhstan’s total power.
ENDS

— This story was first published in issue 432 of the weekly Bulletin on Dec. 27 2019

Romania drops fraud investigation into Kazmunaigas

Leave a Reply

DEC. 11 2019 (The Bulletin) — Prosecutors in Romania told the AFP news agency that they had dropped an investigation into potential tax fraud by Kazakh state oil and gas company Kazmunaigas linked to its purchase of the oil refinery Petromidia from Rompetrol in 2007. In 2016, Romanian investigators briefly seized control of the refinery before Kazmunaigas threatened international arbitration.
ENDS

— This story was first published in issue 432 of the weekly Bulletin on Dec. 27 2019

US’ Tyson Fresh Meats to build beef processing plant in Kazakhstan

Leave a Reply

ALMATY/DEC. 10 2019 (The Bulletin) –Tyson Fresh Meats, a subsidy of the US food giant Tyson Foods, signed a deal with the Kazakh government and the privately-owned Kazakh industrial conglomerate Kusto to build a production facility in the north of the country.

Neither side released financial information on the deal but media reported that the plant should be able to process up to 2,000 heads of cattle per day. By comparison, Tyson’s facilities in the US process around 20,000 heads of cattle per day.

Steve Stouffer, group president of Tyson Fresh Meats, was quoted as saying: “This opportunity supports one of our growth strategies to expand Tyson’s global business, and we look forward to bringing our expertise and capabilities to the country of Kazakhstan.”

Bordering China, Kazakhstan is also geographically important to Tyson’s Asia development plans. China has imposed a 47% tariff on beef imports from the US, part of the two countries protracted trade war. Beef produced in Kazakhstan will not be subject to this tariff.

Kazakhstan has been positioning itself increasingly as a place for cattle farmers to do business. Ranchers from the US have imported livestock to Kazakhstan and corporations have spent millions on improving facilities and promoting beef as a part of the Kazakh diet.

But the deal with Tyson, one of the biggest meat producers in the world, marks a major moment for Kazakhstan’s meat production sector.

Kazakh PM Askar Mamin said: “Tyson is a world-class company with the expertise necessary to help Kazakhstan jump-start the transformation of our agro-protein capabilities and help us create an ecosystem that will increase our beef herd size and establish conditions to support thousands of new high-quality jobs in the country.”
ENDS

— This story was first published in issue 432 of the weekly Bulletin on Dec. 27 2019

Second batch of low-enriched uranium arrives at IAEA site in Kazakhstan

Leave a Reply

DEC. 10 2019 (The Bulletin) — A purpose-built storage facility managed by the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) in eastern Kazakhstan received its second and final consignment of low-enriched uranium (LEU). The site in Ust-Kamenogorsk was set up to allow countries developing nuclear power to buy fuel for their power stations safely.

ENDS

— This story was first published in issue 432 of the weekly Bulletin on Dec. 27 2019

Nazarbayev given honorary Central Asia role

Leave a Reply

DEC. 6 (The Bulletin) — Kazakhstan’s former president, Nursultan Nazarbayev, was named honorary chairman of the Consultative Meeting of the Heads of State of Central Asia, a talking shop for the region’s leaders, at its meeting in Tashkent. Mr Nazarbayev said immediately after quitting the presidency in March this year that he wanted to maintain a role in Kazakh politics. He also sees himself as the elder statesman of Central Asia, a position this title cements.
ENDS

— This story was first published in issue 431 of the weekly Bulletin on Dec. 9 2019

Tokayev says that Russia did not annex Crimea

Leave a Reply

DEC. 4 (The Bulletin) — Kazakh President Kassym-Jomart Tokayev said in an interview with the German newspaper Deutsche Welle that Russia hadn’t annexed Crimea in 2014. He insisted that the word annexation was too strong to use in the context of Crimea. Western policy has always been that Russia illegally annexed Crimea from Ukraine. Mr Tokayev also said that Kazakhstan had no concern that Russia was looking to annex Russian populated areas of northern Kazakhstan.
ENDS

— This story was first published in issue 431 of the weekly Bulletin on Dec. 9 2019

Kazakhstan plans to return men to China

Leave a Reply

DEC. 7 (The Bulletin) — Kazakhstan’s National Security Committee said that two ethnic Kazakhs who crossed over from China’s western Xinjiang province illegally to escape what they said was the persecution of Muslim minorities will be returned to the Chinese authorities. A court case against Kaster Musakhan and Murager Alimuly for crossing the border illegally in October is due to begin soon but Darkhan Dilmanov, deputy head of Kazakhstan’s National Security Committee has already said that they have “no chance” of staying.
ENDS

— This story was first published in issue 431 of the weekly Bulletin on Dec. 9 2019

Kazakhstan prepares to bail out banks, again

Leave a Reply

ALMATY/Dec. 9 (The Bulletin) –Kazakhstan is preparing another $1b bailout of its banking system, a sign that the economy is recovering at a slower pace-then-expected from a 2014 downturn and also that banks have not been reformed substantially to deal with this sluggish economic growth.

Reuters quoted two sources who were described as being familiar with the plans as saying that an asset quality review had shown up holes in the balance sheets of at least four banks.
The Central Bank, Kazakhstan’s financial regulator, has declined to comment but if these asset gaps are confirmed it will be another blow to Kazakhstan’s prestige as the financial centre of the region.

Western analysts have criticised the Kazakh banking system for handing out loans to consumers too easily, for being poorly run and for owners using banks as personal slush funds.
Last year, the Kazakh government forced the merger of the two biggest banks in the country into one super-bank, Halyk Bank, under the ownership of Timur Kulibayev, the son-in-law of former Kazakh president Nursultan Nazarbayev. On top of this, the government has also spent an estimated $13b already on bailing out banks.
ENDS

— This story was first published in issue 431 of the weekly Bulletin on Dec. 9 2019

Markets: Copper price rise fails to give KAZ Minerals a boost

Leave a Reply

DEC. 9 (The Bulletin) — A 10% rise in the price of copper failed to give KAZ Minerals, the Kazakhstan-focused copper producer, much of a lift. Analysts said that the price rise was already, broadly, built into its share price.

It did, though, give Central Asia Metals a bit of a lift pushing it up 2% to 211p. It has been hovering around this level for some time.

In other metals news, Anglo Asian Mining, the Azerbaijan-centric gold producer, jumped up more than 6%.

Analysts said that the fall in value of Centerra Gold’s stocks was linked to its problems in Mongolia and not to the Kumtor mine in Kyrgyzstan.

Georgian banks both increased in value after the Central Bank intervened to prop up its ailing currency. They are sensitive to Georgian macro-economic news.
ENDS

— This story was first published in issue 431 of the weekly Bulletin on Dec. 9 2019