Kazakh tenge ready to appreciate - Marchenko

The fundamentals for the Kazakh tenge to appreciate are in place, central bank chairman Grigoriy Marchenko said on Wednesday, citing rising oil prices and improving current account.

Earlier this week, Marchenko said that the central bank would expand the trading corridor for the tenge from the current range of KZT145 to KZT155 per dollar. While the exact range of the trading corridor has not yet been determined, the target rate would remain KZT150 per dollar.

Kazakhstan's economy which had been hit hard by the global economic crisis and the subsequent plunge of oil prices has begun to pick up, as the global price of oil started to recover. The oil price has so far risen by 77 percent in 2009, and Kazakhstan reported a preliminary current account surplus of about $300 million in the third quarter, after several quarters of deficit.

SRI