Kazakhstani firms eyeing Hong Kong, mainland China urged to take long-term view

Kazakhstan’s businesses should prioritise long-term fundraising ambitions rather than quick wins in the Hong Kong and mainland Chinese markets, the managing director of the Central Asian country’s sovereign wealth fund has said.

Saltanat Satzhan, managing director for development and privatisation at sovereign wealth fund Samruk-Kazyna, said she also aimed to list state-owned rail operator Kazakhstan Temir Zholy (KTZ) in Hong Kong by the end of the year.

KTZ, wholly owned by the government through its sovereign wealth fund, has filed listing applications in Hong Kong, London and Astana. The planned listing would mark the first company under Samruk-Kazyna to go public in Hong Kong.

Satzhan stressed that KTZ was much more than a domestic railway, serving as a vital geopolitical stabiliser connecting China with Europe.

“If you invest in Kazakhstan’s national railway, you’re not just investing in the domestic operator, but in the connectivity of the companies that connect China and Europe,” she said during a panel discussion at the Astana Finance Days forum in the Kazakh capital on Thursday.

“That’s why we are hoping we can go public by the end of this year, and we are anticipating this transaction.”