Kazakhstan is embracing cutting-edge fintech.
November 10, 2020
Writer:
Kim Iskyan
The central Asian nation of Kazakhstan may be geographically distant, however distant will not be a barrier within the digital world, and Kazakhstan is more and more establishing a presence in fintech. In mid-October, Kazakh fintech agency Kaspi.kz raised a complete of $1 billion within the second-largest London Stock Trade providing of 2020, valuing the corporate at $6.5 billion. The shares may even commerce on the Astana Worldwide Trade.
This marked a giant turnaround for Kaspi.kz, which scrapped an IPO in late 2019 that might have valued the corporate at round $four billion. The floated stake was held by Russia-based enterprise capital agency Baring Vostok, Goldman Sachs, Kaspi.kz’s chairman Vyacheslav Kim and its CEO Mikheil Lomtadze.
Kaspi.kz has slightly below eight million customers in Kazakhstan—which is 4 instances the scale of Texas and has a inhabitants of simply 19 million. Kazakhs use Kaspi.kz for all the things from invoice funds, loans, private monetary administration, and as an internet market. It’s additionally used as a cash different at retailers all through the nation. The corporate says it’s planning to increase into on-line journey and lengthen its attain into central Asian neighbors and into the Caucasus area.
It was the primary providing in Kazakhstan in two years. Different potential issuers from the nation embrace KazMunaiGas, the nation’s state-run oil and gasoline firm, which final yr delayed an IPO. The nationwide air provider, Air Astana, in addition to telecoms supplier Kazakhtelecom additionally noticed their rumored choices postponed.
Some of the high-profile Kazakh firms on the worldwide markets was miner Eurasian Nationwide Sources Company, which joined the FTSE 100 in 2008, however fell afoul of regulators and was de-listed 2013.
