The Public Foundation “Elge Qaitaru” demands that authorities investigate Kenes Rakishev and the pool of banks' suspicious deal

Mr O.A. Bektenov, Prime Minister of the Republic of Kazakhstan, Chairman of the Asset Recovery Commission.

To the Prosecutor General of the Republic of Kazakhstan Mr B.N. Asylov.

To the Chairman of the Agency of the Republic of Kazakhstan on coun­ter­ac­tion to cor­rup­tion Mr Zhumagali A.J.

Mr D.M. Malakhov, Chairman of the Agency of the Republic of Kazakhstan on Financial Monitoring.

Mr N.M. Suindikov, Chairman of the Asset Recovery Committee of the General Prosecutor’s Office of the Republic of Kazakhstan.

The Public Foundation “Elge Qaitaru” received from the sender “North Atlantic Assets Recovery Team” the text of “Framework Agreement (here­inafter — the Agreement) between the Government of the Republic of Kazakhstan rep­re­sent­ed by the Ministry of Finance, the National Bank of the Republic of Kazakhstan, JSC “National Welfare Fund “Samruk-Kazyna”, JSC “Problem Loans Fund “, JSC “Kazkommertsbank”, JSC “BTA Bank”, JSC “Halyk Savings Bank of Kazakhstan” and the cit­i­zen of the Republic of Kazakhstan Rakishev Kenes Khamituly”, con­clud­ed on 2 June 2017.

Under this Agreement, in 2017, for the pur­pose of finan­cial reha­bil­i­ta­tion of Kazkommertsbank JSC, the National Bank of the Republic of Kazakhstan pro­vid­ed the Joint Stock Company “Problem Loan Fund” with 470,196,000,000 (four hun­dred and sev­en­ty bil­lion one hun­dred and nine­ty six mil­lion) Tenge and the Ministry of Finance of the Republic of Kazakhstan 2,092,941,288,400 (two tril­lion nine­ty two bil­lion nine hun­dred forty one mil­lion two hun­dred eighty eight thou­sand four hun­dred) Tenge for redemp­tion of trou­bled assets BTA Bank JSC and Kazkommertsbank JSC .

JSC “Problem Loan Fund”, hav­ing added avail­able own funds, made pur­chase from JSC “BTA Bank” of prob­lem assets JSC “BTA Bank” and JSC “Kazkommertsbank” for the total amount 2 639 771 120 000 (two tril­lion six hun­dred thir­ty nine bil­lion sev­en hun­dred sev­en­ty one mil­lion one hun­dred twen­ty thou­sand) tenge , hav­ing made full prepayment.

BTA Bank JSC from the received amounts 239,771,120,000 (two hun­dred thir­ty nine bil­lion sev­en hun­dred sev­en­ty one mil­lion one hun­dred twen­ty thou­sand) Tenge was used to repay the loan to JSC “National Welfare Fund “Samruk-Kazyna” , the remain­ing part, as we believe, was trans­ferred to Kazkommertsbank JSC for repay­ment of the exist­ing loan, pay­ment of trou­bled assets, etc.

After achiev­ing cer­tain goals on finan­cial reha­bil­i­ta­tion of Kazkommertsbank JSC, Rakishev K.H. sells his ordi­nary shares of Kazkommertsbank JSC in the amount of 686,576,349 shares, rep­re­sent­ing 86.09% of their total num­ber. The shares are sold to Halyk Savings Bank of Kazakhstan Joint Stock Company for 1 (one) tenge.

In addi­tion, National Welfare Fund Samruk-Kazyna JSC sells its com­mon shares of Kazkommertsbank JSC in the amount of 85,517,241 shares, rep­re­sent­ing 10.72% of their total num­ber, to Halyk Savings Bank of Kazakhstan Joint Stock Company also for KZT1 (one).

Given the above, the “Elge Qaitaru” Public Foundation asks you to inves­ti­gate the fol­low­ing issues.

1. Based on what and whose cal­cu­la­tions was the deci­sion to res­cue Kazkommertsbank JSC exact­ly in the amount of 2,639,771,120,000 (two tril­lion six hun­dred thir­ty-nine bil­lion sev­en hun­dred sev­en­ty-one mil­lion one hun­dred twen­ty thou­sand) Tenge made?
2. Why was the algo­rithm of actions cho­sen, pro­vid­ing first for full pre­pay­ment and only then for legal due dili­gence of the assets to be bought out?

An inde­pen­dent appraisal of the mar­ket val­ue of the redeemable assets is not pro­vid­ed for in the Agreement at all. When and by whom was such an appraisal car­ried out?

3. Murat Temirkhanov, a well-known finan­cial expert, wrote in the exclu­sive.kz web­site that “the mar­ket val­ue of the repur­chased assets accord­ing to the results of an inde­pen­dent appraisal was 268bn tenge, or 10 times less than the amount paid! As a result, FPC recog­nised a loss of KZT2,372bn on this pur­chase of assets”. (https://www.exclusive.kz/expertiza/finansy/117318)

The said loss, con­sist­ing of real peo­ple’s mon­ey, could not have evap­o­rat­ed into thin air and on whose bal­ance sheet was this amount reflect­ed as income? Have tax­es even been paid out of it?

4. After achiev­ing cer­tain results on finan­cial reha­bil­i­ta­tion of Kazkommertsbank JSC, why was not an assess­ment of its mar­ket val­ue for the pur­pose of sell­ing the bank’s shares through pub­lic auc­tion with the involve­ment of a wide range of investors, instead, tar­get­ed sale was car­ried out?
5. An arti­cle appeared on Forbes.kz on 21 May 2018 claim­ing that “Timur and Dinara Kulibayev’s total for­tune increased from last year’s $4.2bn to $6.4bn through the acqui­si­tion of Kazkommertsbank, which received 2.4 tril­lion tenge of state mon­ey for reha­bil­i­ta­tion before the sale”. (https://forbes.kz/leader/lideryi_rosta_kulibaevyi_1526820904/#)

If this state­ment is true, does the Republic of Kazakhstan have the right to claim a part of the shares of JSC Halyk Savings Bank of Kazakhstan?

6. In order to buy out prob­lem assets BTA Bank JSC and Kazkommertsbank JSC with finan­cial reha­bil­i­ta­tion of the lat­ter, 2.4 tril­lion tenge of peo­ple’s mon­ey was irre­triev­ably lost. Has the cir­cle of per­sons whose actions led to this been deter­mined? Have the per­sons to whom the state has mate­r­i­al or oth­er legal claims in con­nec­tion with this been identified?

(In this case, under the Agreement, the list of redeemable assets of BTA Bank JSC did not include assets relat­ed in one way or anoth­er to Mukhtar Ablyazov)

7. In an inter­view with Kommersant news­pa­per on 11 May 2018. K. Rakishev stat­ed that he has more than $1bn of cleared assets and $3.5bn of claims to oth­er par­ties on his bal­ance sheet. While BTA has no finan­cial lia­bil­i­ties to third par­ties as a result of the trans­fer of $3bn of lia­bil­i­ties to depos­i­tors to Kazkommertsbank JSC.

(https://www.kommersant.ru/doc/3624151)

Due to the fact that K. Rakishev had nei­ther polit­i­cal, legal or any oth­er oppor­tu­ni­ties for this, then at the expense of whose admin­is­tra­tive and polit­i­cal resources this trans­ac­tion was car­ried out, and who is its real beneficiary?

In case of estab­lish­ment of facts of dam­age accord­ing to the results of the inves­ti­ga­tion of the cir­cum­stances of the trans­ac­tion. Public Foundation Elge Qaitaru asks you to bring to respon­si­bil­i­ty the guilty per­sons, to pro­vide com­pen­sa­tion for dam­age and to inform about the deci­sions taken.

Director of the Public Foundation “Elge Qaitaru” O. Yerzhanov