The meeting heard the report of the National Bank for 2017 and the presentation of prospects for the country's financial sector development.
The President of Kazakhstan, noting the improvement of national measures and the inflation in the given corridor, focused on the state support of the banking system and the need for strengthening the supervision of the activities of financial institutions by the regulator.
- The state provided unprecedented support to the banking system, allocating more than KZT 3 trillion. At the same time, the volume of bank loans did not increase and amounted to KZT 12.7 trillion by the end of 2017. The share of non-performing loans was 10%. This year, the National Bank's program for the banks’ recovery that have very poor performance will be closed. These banks have negative indicators due to non-efficient management of shareholders; they have increased their debts and cannot provide depositors with the fulfilment of their obligations. What is the way out of this situation? To preserve these banks, shareholders should invest their own financial resources in order to return the money that they previously withdrew from there, the Head of State said.
Nursultan Nazarbayev dwelled on measures to restart the financial sector, outlined in this year's Address to the Nation of Kazakhstan and Five Social Initiatives.
- At present, there is a problem of long-term crediting of economy. It is necessary to revive the stock market, as well as timely and efficiently respond to situations arising in the banking system. In view of adopting amendments to the law on currency regulation, which is currently under discussion in the Parliament, it is critical to begin work on 7-20-25 Program as early as this year. I ask the Parliament to expedite consideration of this issue until the end of the current session. This is important for actualization of Five Social Initiatives voiced by me, and addressed to every citizen, the President of Kazakhstan said.
In turn, Daniyar Akishev noted that in 2017 the National Bank’s activity was focused on ensuring the stability of market prices and normalizing the work of the banking sector.
- The financial market is stable. Macroeconomic indicators and indicators of the financial sector’s development are consistently improving. We expect that in 2018 inflation will develop in the corridor of 5-7%. As of the end of February 2018, the rate on loans in tenge for legal entities decreased to 12.9%, the Chairman of the National Bank said.
In addition, D. Akishev commented on the situation with the exchange rate of tenge and the impact of external and internal factors on it.
- Last week, there were events related to the US economic sanctions against certain Russian companies and individuals. Accordingly, there have been some changes on the Russian stock and foreign exchange market, which, naturally, also influenced Kazakhstan’s currency market, which in a freely floating exchange rate is a normal phenomenon. At the same time, the market reaction itself was not directly proportional, as the rouble rate fell by more than 10%, while tenge in nominal terms declined by only 3%, the Chairman of the National Bank said.
Following the meeting, the Head of State, noting the improvement of the National Bank's activity, has given a number of specific instructions.
