International financial center to be set up in Kazakh capital, says president

ASTANA, May 22. /TASS/. An international financial center will be set up in the Kazakh capital Astana, to be housed in facilities built for Expo2017 international exhibition, President Nursultan Nazarbayev said on Friday. "I have signed a decree to set up international financial center Astana," seen as a future financial hub for the whole Central Asian region, he said at the 8th Astana Economic Forum. As soon as the exhibition the capital hosts in 2017 ends, its infrastructure will be transferred to the financial center, he added. "We held profound negotiations with the Dubai International Financial Centre and agreed that we will fully take over their legislation, economy in the activity of the financial center of Kazakhstan," he added, saying the center would operate on the basis of "English law" and will have "preferential tax regime". "We believe the financial center Astana will become the core of Kazakhstan’s financial system and a financial hub for the whole Central Asian region in the future," he said, noting that Kazakhstan’s largest city Almaty that lost its status as capital to Astana in 1997, would "remain the center of financial services and financial intermediation to investors. Read more