In Kazakhstan oil refinery plans to issue bonds

/IRBIS, July 21, 00/ - REUTERS informs, with the reference to financial director of Shymkent oil refinery Shymkentnefteorgsintez (SHNOS), Erlan Angarbaev, that till the end of this year the company plans to launch bonds with three year circulation term on the domestic market for a total of $20-$25 mln. He said those were preliminary estimates, and that they even did not know who would be a financial agent. We are just working in this direction, he added. Financial director said the matter on the preparation of the bond issue would be discussed at an extraordinary meeting of SHNOS shareholders to be held on August 21. He added that the funds would be used to invest in the production and restoring the working capital of the company. It is said that such companies as Kazakhstan temir joly (railroads), national oil and gas company Kazakhoil, electricity company KEGOC, Halyk Bank and others have already launched their bonds on domestic market in this year. SHNOS, located in the south of the country, is said to be the only company among all three companies of the country to work stable in oil refinery industry. The company's processing of oil fell from 3.65 mln tons in 1998 to 3.4 mln tons in 1999, while pretax income of the company rose from KZT3.6 bln in 1998 to KZT12.4 bln in last year. The company explains the income growth against the drop in production by the measures taken to cut the costs and improvement of financial management. The company's plan for this year is to process 3.2 mln tons of crude oil. In late March of 2000 the company merged with the Canadian oil company Hurricane Hydrocarbons.