NUR-SULTAN (TCA) — Kazakhstan’s National Welfare Fund Samruk-Kazyna is planning to hold an initial public offering (IPO) and sell off another eight companies affiliated with it to strategic investors, Sputnik news agency reported with reference to the Fund’s press service.
The Fund is implementing an ambitious privatization program that has been approved by the government of Kazakhstan. Under the Yellow Pages principle, 89 companies have gone public, and 192 billion tenge have been earned, Chairman of the Fund’s Management Board Akhmetzhan Yesimov said at a plenary meeting on the future of energy sources and innovation growth, part of Kazakhstan Energy Week held late in September.
He recalled that a 15 per cent stake in uranium company NAC Kazatomprom had been placed successfully in a November 2018 IPO. The National Bank acted as one of the investors and purchased corporate securities worth $150 million, allocating it to the Joint Pension Savings Fund. The deal has netted the Fund 21 billion tenge to date.
“We plan to hold an IPO and to provide a strategic investor with eight of the Fund’s companies operating in the energy, telecommunications and infrastructure sectors. The Pension Fund has earned 21 billion tenge, with the National Welfare Fund receiving 168 billion tenge,” Yesimov said.
Since the Kazatomprom IPO, the company’s market value has increased from $3 billion to $4 billion. Kazatomprom also implements a project to manufacture fuel assemblies for nuclear power plants with a 30 billion tenge investment.
The Government of Kazakhstan is the only shareholder of the National Welfare Fund Samruk-Kazyna. Established in 2008, the Fund is a commercial investment holding with an estimated $67 billion in assets. The Samruk-Kazyna Group includes companies in the oil and gas and transport-logistics sectors, the chemical and nuclear industries, the mining-metallurgical and energy sectors.
