Central Bank Governor turns down suggestions of a single pension fund in Kazakhstan

Central Bank Governor Gregory Marchenko doesn’t support the recent suggestions of merging all the country’s pension funds into a single fund. He said that in the latest TV show "Professionalnyi Razgovor" (“Professional Talk”) run by Ms. Zhannat Ertlessova [ex Vice Minister of Finance, ex Vice Head of President’s Administration, ex Vice Minister of Defense among other positions]. Mr. Marchenko doesn’t support the World Bank’s suggestion on launching a single pension fund. “We [the Central Bank] turn down the suggestion with indignation. It is wrong to invest the accumulated pension assets abroad”, he believes. According to the Central Bank Governor, the major reason why such suggestions have been surfacing is that the pension savings figure currently stands at $18 billion, and “it is a lucrative lump of interest to many, and many entities would want to decide on investing the funds”. Mr. Marchenko emphasized that Kazakhstan needs to think of public private partnerships to launch investment projects inside the country. He believes about $6 billion of pension assets could be invested into domestic projects involving dependable borrowers. Tengrinews.kz reported earlier that Kazakhstan is allegedly developing a new concept of its pension accumulation system through merging all the current pension funds into a single state-owned fund to be managed by a foreign company.

Central Bank Governor Gregory Marchenko doesn’t support the recent suggestions of merging all the country’s pension funds into a single fund. He said that in the latest TV show "Professionalnyi Razgovor" (“Professional Talk”) run by Ms. Zhannat Ertlessova [ex Vice Minister of Finance, ex Vice Head of President’s Administration, ex Vice Minister of Defense among other positions]. Mr. Marchenko doesn’t support the World Bank’s suggestion on launching a single pension fund. “We [the Central Bank] turn down the suggestion with indignation. It is wrong to invest the accumulated pension assets abroad”, he believes. According to the Central Bank Governor, the major reason why such suggestions have been surfacing is that the pension savings figure currently stands at $18 billion, and “it is a lucrative lump of interest to many, and many entities would want to decide on investing the funds”. Mr. Marchenko emphasized that Kazakhstan needs to think of public private partnerships to launch investment projects inside the country. He believes about $6 billion of pension assets could be invested into domestic projects involving dependable borrowers. Tengrinews.kz reported earlier that Kazakhstan is allegedly developing a new concept of its pension accumulation system through merging all the current pension funds into a single state-owned fund to be managed by a foreign company.

World Bank pension fund news National Bank Marchenko Kazakhstan Kazakh