Hong Kong Exchanges and Clearing Limited (HKEX) said on Tuesday that it had signed memoranda of understanding with the Astana International Financial Centre (AIFC) and the Astana International Exchange (AIX) to deepen market connectivity and cooperation.
The agreements follow recent HKEX outreach to Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan, including a delegation trip with HKEX Chief Executive Bonnie Y Chan and Hong Kong Chief Executive John Lee Ka-chiu. HKEX had sent exchange teams to Kazakhstan two weeks before the delegation, The Standard reported.
The AIFC, which has 5,700 registered companies, over 1,220 of them from mainland China and Hong Kong, is positioning itself as Central Asia’s capital-markets hub. Dim sum bonds listed on AIX have reached 1.25 billion yuan.
“We don’t compete. We actually complement each other,” said Renat Bekturov, Governor of the AIFC. “We will follow up with real transactions.”
HKEX sees strategic alignment with AIX in matching capital with the region’s mining and new-economy sectors. Chan had signalled the push before the trip, telling RTHK that HKEX wanted to remain “a very accessible market” for global companies seeking a deeper capital-raising platform.
