2000-01-17 Kazak Politics & MacroEconomics
Article Index
Kazakhstan Weekly
Politics & Macro Economics
Monday January 17, 2000
Tenge Drops 64.6% in 1999
The exchange rate of Kazakhstan’s national currency, the tenge, dropped 64.6% in 1999 (10.7% in 1998) to 138.25 tenge/USD 1 by the end of the year, the National Bank (NB) of Kazakhstan’s Chairman, Grigory Marchenko, said at a press conference. The tenge suffered its worst drop in value (30.3%) after it was allowed to float freely against the U.S. dollar on 5 April 1999. The exchange rate was 88.3 tenge/USD 1 at the time. Marchenko said that in the following months the soft decline of the tenge was the result of a relative currency exchange balance.
The volume of Kazakhstani bank transactions on the stock segment of the currency market grew during 1999 by 61.4% to over USD 2.1 billion from 1998. The NB bought currency worth USD 10.3 million on the market last year, Marchenko said. (Interfax, Bloomberg)
National Bank Reports Growth in Gold and Foreign Currency Reserves
Kazakhstan’s gross gold and foreign currency reserves increased by 1.98% in 1999 compared to 1998, reaching USD 2 billion, said Grigory Marchenko (the Chairman of the NB) at a news conference.
He said that the republic’s net gold and foreign currency reserves amounted to USD 1.52 billion, which was USD 228.8 million more than in 1998. (Interfax, Bloomberg)