Will oil and ruble drag AZN with them?

Continuing oil price decline and slump of Russian ruble exchange rate will not lead to devaluation of Azerbaijani manat, said expert Demetrios Efstafiu, who is in charge of the strategy of the biggest bank group of Africa, Central and Eastern Europe and Near East, Standard Bank.

“The current AZN was not devalued before and it is a big question if it could be devalued now,” Voice of America quoted him as saying.

There is, certainly, a theoretic probability of devaluation of AZN, but such a course of development of events is most probable in Kazakhstan, concluded the expert.

“Azerbaijan is among the biggest oil exporters among the former Soviet republics and it has a more reliable balance as one of the fastest growing economies in the world during the past decade,” said the same source.

The markets expect further devaluation of tenge by 20% in the coming 3-6 months. Kazakhstan currency has already undergone devaluation by 19% last year. The same could be said about Armenian dram and Georgian lari,  though rates of these currencies float freer, than tenge. The analysts expect that they will continue declining in addition to the bond markets in these countries.

“It is obvious that a sharp fall in Ruble exchange rate and oil price exerts a strong pressure on all these countries,” said Peter Matis, strategist of the developing markets in Netherland Rabobank.

The characteristic of Kazakhstan’s dependence on the oil revenues is very different from the situation in Azerbaijan. This especially reflects the exchange policy.—0—