Economy
State-budget revenue excluding transfers reached 20.2 trillion tenge in nine months, up 16.3%, the finance ministry said. Tax receipts rose by 3 trillion tenge. We explain why more nominal revenue does not automatically translate into the same increase in spending power or better public services.
Economy
The IMF’s October outlook projects global growth of 3.1% in 2026 and 3.4% in 2027. Gains from AI investment remain uneven, while inflation pressure persists. We examine why energy importers and lower-income countries face a harder outlook than the headline average suggests.
Economy
Kazakhstan reported a $2.4 billion current-account surplus for the first half of 2026, reversing a deficit in the same period last year. We examine the export figures and explain why a stronger external balance does not by itself guarantee a stronger currency.
Economy
The regulator has detailed findings from an investigation into coordinated securities transactions and measures taken against those involved. On 8 October the Bank of Russia said a group of affiliated companies and their owners had made coordinated trades in Sibur Holding and Rostelecom bonds in 2025.
Economy
IMF chief Kristalina Georgieva says AI investment, expensive energy and mounting government debt are pulling the world economy in different directions. AI-related hardware already accounts for more than a tenth of goods trade, she said, but the gains are concentrated in relatively few economies.
Economy
A prosecutor has described 6.5 trillion tenge in asset-recovery results. Roughly 5.2 trillion of that is commitments to future projects, not cash received by the state. We compare the new interview with the official annual report and separate the figures.
Economy
Using official NBK data, we show how bank money works: why a loan simultaneously creates a deposit, how a KZT 15.79 trillion monetary base coexists with KZT 54.99 trillion of broad money, and why credit growth remains part of Kazakhstan’s inflation problem.
Economy
The Kazakhstan Stock Exchange index closed September 28 at 7,721.69 points, down 0.83%, while turnover in index shares increased to KZT 792.4 million. Kazatomprom, Kaspi.kz, and KazTransOil were among the largest decliners. Here is why one session should not be confused with a lasting trend.
Economy
Mavrodi set the price of his own tickets twice a week, and his pyramid did not collapse — it was stopped from outside. He was seventy-six years late: the initials MMM already belonged to a Federal Reserve workbook describing how banks make money out of thin air. The US national debt stands at 40 trillion.
Economy
The shulhani was the money changer at his table in the Temple of Jerusalem, swapping foreign coin for the Tyrian shekel — the only currency the temple tax could be paid in. He took four to eight per cent and produced nothing: his income came from the fact that somebody else's payment was compulsory. Jesus overturned his tables.
Economy
People have argued about Palantir for twenty years, but about the wrong thing. It started in 2003 on money from the CIA's venture fund and hides nothing about what it does — its chief executive says so publicly. What matters is not the founders' rhetoric but the charter: one class of shares gives them 49.999999% of the vote.
Economy
Four lenses write about Kazakhstan — the official, the critical, the business and the geopolitical — and each is built not to notice something. We gather the figures without a lens and examine what none of them sees: the country measures its summit, while the strength of an economy is decided at its floor, not its peak.
Economy
Aristotle split household management in two: oikonomia, providing for real needs, and chrematistics, accumulating money for its own sake. The second won and named itself economics. Why the Greek called interest offspring, why all three Abrahamic faiths forbade usury, and what a central bank's refinancing rate really is.
Economy
Money looks like a thing — coins, notes, figures in an account. In substance it is an agreement: a banknote has value not in itself but because everyone around has agreed to take it in exchange for work. First people trusted gold, then states, now increasingly code. Why inflation destroys not notes but trust.
