Kazakhstan Sweep 100324

Kazakhstan Sweep 100324

Summary

·  Kazakhstan’s central bank will limit the tenge’s appreciation as a further strengthening would be “detrimental” to the economy, Governor Grigori Marchenko said on March 24. The bank has bought $8 billion in the past five months to curb the currency’s rise.

·  Kazakhstan is planning to boost its uranium exports to Japan and increase its share on the Japanese uranium market from the current 4% to 40%, the Kazakh foreign minister said on March 24.

·  National Atomic Company Kazatomprom and Sumitomo Corporation (Japan) have signed a constituent document related to establishment of the Joint Venture 'Summit Atom Rare Earth Company' (SARECO) in the field of rare and rare-earth metals, Trend.az reported on March 24.

Kazakh Central Bank to Limit Tenge’s Strength, Marchenko Says

March 24, 2010, 12:18 PM EDT

http://www.businessweek.com/news/2010-03-24/kazakh-central-bank-to-limit-tenge-s-strength-marchenko-says.html

By Agnes Lovasz

March 24 (Bloomberg) -- Kazakhstan’s central bank will limit the tenge’s appreciation as a further strengthening would be “detrimental” to the economy, Governor Grigori Marchenko said.

The bank has bought $8 billion in the past five months to curb the currency’s rise, Marchenko said in an interview while attending a financial conference in Prague today. The tenge has risen 2.7 percent in the past six months, compared with a 0.3 percent gain between March and September last year. It was unchanged today at 146.9750 to the dollar.

“We believe that a stronger appreciation could be detrimental to the economy,” Marchenko said. “If oil prices and metals prices are high, appreciation will continue. We will prevent” excessive appreciation “from happening.”

The central bank in central Asia’s biggest oil producer accepts that some gains in the currency are inevitable as energy and commodity prices rise due to the global recovery, he said. The bank is keeping the tenge between 127.50 and 165 tenge per dollar, a range the central bank is aiming to maintain until March 20, 2011.

The country devalued the tenge 21 percent last February as the country’s worst financial crisis in more than a decade forced the government to seize control of BTA Bank, then its biggest lender, and spend more than $19 billion to prop up the economy.

Reserves

The 15.9 trillion-tenge ($107.8 billion) economy expanded 1.2 percent last year. The country averted a recession as the government used reserves accumulated between 2000 and 2007, when soaring commodities prices fueled an average annual economic expansion of 10 percent, to spur growth and bail out banks.

The tenge faces pressure to appreciate given rising revenue from Kazakhstan’s exports of commodities, oil and metals rather than speculators betting on the currency’s gains, Marchenko said. Kazakhstan holds 3.2 percent of the world’s oil reserves according to BP Plc.

Currencies in some of Kazakhstan’s 20 major trading partners, such as Russia and Azerbaijan, are also strengthening, though the tenge’s gains so far are not threatening the country’s competitiveness, he said.

At the current exchange rate, moves to curb the tenge are still “affordable,” Marchenko said.

In 2006 Kazakhstan attracted $7 billion of funds from abroad as investors bet the tenge will strengthen, Marchenko said. This year, foreign investment has totaled $500 million, he said.

The central bank said on March 3 interest rates will rise if the price of crude oil stays at $70 a barrel. Such a scenario will see the key refinancing rate rise a full percentage point to 8 percent, the Almaty-based bank said.

Kazakhstan plans to capture 40% of Japan's uranium market

18:2524/03/2010

http://en.rian.ru/exsoviet/20100324/158300048.html

Kazakhstan is planning to boost its uranium exports to Japan and increase its share on the Japanese uranium market from the current 4% to 40%, the Kazakh foreign minister said on Wednesday.

Kanat Saudabayev said in an interview with Japan's Nikkei news agency that the basic principles and areas of bilateral cooperation in civilian nuclear power engineering were defined in an intergovernmental agreement signed between the two countries in Tokyo on March 2, 2010.

"It [the agreement] allows for the expansion of the sphere of interaction. In particular, Kazakhstan is interested in obtaining nuclear power technologies from Japan," he said.

A package of documents signed between Kazatomprom, Kazakhstan's national operator for the import and export of uranium, and Japanese companies stipulated broader cooperation in the nuclear fuel cycle, he said.

"The implementation of these accords will make it possible in coming years to increase the share of Kazakh uranium products on the Japanese market from 3-4% to 40%, of which about 30% will be highly processed products," he said.

TOKYO, March 24 (RIA Novosti)

Kazatomprom establishes joint venture with Japanese company

24.03.2010 17:49

http://en.trend.az/capital/companies/1658460.html

Kazatomprom establishes joint venture with Japanese company

Kazakhstan, Astana, March 24 / Trend Capital S. Suleymanov /

March 24, 2010, National Atomic Company Kazatomprom and Sumitomo Corporation (Japan) have signed a constituent document related to establishment of the Joint Venture 'Summit Atom Rare Earth Company' (SARECO) in the field of rare and rare-earth metals (RM & REM).

SARECO establishment has become a practical materialization of the order of Nursultan Nazarbayev, President of Kazakhstan in accordance with the results of his visit to Japan in 2008.

For Kazakhstan the development of rare and rare-earth metal deposits and production operations on RM and REM basis is the new profile of industrial and innovation development of the country which will lead to setting up in the country of high-technology high-value added products manufacturing and ensure to take its own niche at the emerging REM market.

The ceremony of signing of the constituent documents was hold in Tokyo in the Japan Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry. This document was signed by Mr.Vladimir Shkolnik, Chairman of the Board of Kazatomprom on the part of Kazakhstan and Mr. Susumu Kato, President of Sumitomo Corporation on the part of Japan. Mr.Kanat Saudabayev, Secretary of State - Minister of Foreign Affairs of the Republic of Kazakhstan, and Mr.Masayuki Naoshima, Minister of Economy, Trade and Industry of Japan attended this ceremony.

Kazatomprom will own 51 percent of JV being established, Sumitomo Corporation - 49 percent. SARECO principal office will be in Ust-Kamenogorsk (Kazakhstan).

The JV will be aimed at building up of vertically integrated company for manufacturing of rare-earth higher value added products.

At the initial stage SARECO will be engaged in the development of Feasibility Study (FS) of rare and rare-earth metals manufacturing. The Project provides for construction and commissioning of mining and processing complex, hydrometallurgical production of REM bulk concentrates, chemical production operations for REM separation into individual metal oxides. Uranium tailing ponds, uranium ores in-situ leaching solutions and mineral deposits of rare-earth metals will be used as potential sources of rare and rare-earth compounds and metals.

Besides, new JV will deal with export and sale of finished product.

It is expected that Summit Atom Rare Earth Company will start its operations already in June, 2010.

Establishment of SARECO was preceded by 'Memorandum of Understanding and Mutually Beneficial Cooperation under the Project for rare earth metals development in the Republic of Kazakhstan' between Japanese Sumitomo Corporation and JOGMEC, as well as by the 'Agreement related to general provisions of joint activity for development of Feasibility Study of rare-earth metals manufacturing' with Sumitomo Corporation. Both these documents were signed on October 22, 2009, in Astana within the framework of the tenth joint meeting of Kazakh-Japanese and Japan-Kazakh committees of economical cooperation.

Today Japan is the largest worldwide importer of rare-earth metals. The new line of cooperation with Kazakhstan plays an important role in diversification of rare-earth element supply to the domestic market of Japan.

Rare and rare-earth elements are the basis for manufacturing of high-technology products. They are widely used in various branches of technology: radio electronics, instrumentation, nuclear engineering, machinery, chemical industry, metallurgy, etc. Rare-earth elements are included as a compound of special purpose glasses, besides rare-earth element single-crystalline compounds are used for producing of laser and other optical active and nonlinear elements in optoelectronics and in the manufacturing of rechargeable batteries for automobile construction (electromotive cars).