Kazkommertsbank issued its debut eurobonds in May 1998. This USD 100 million eurobond issue with a maturity of 3 years is due on 8^th of May 2001, with a 11.25% coupon paid annually. ING Barings acted as the lead manager, and the syndicate included ABN AMRO, Chase Manhattan, HSBC, Santander Investment, WestMerchant., Commerzbank, BT Alex Brown International, and Kazkommerts Securities. This debut issue of eurobonds was well received by the investor community and it was oversubscribed. The eurobonds are traded at the Luxembourg Exchange and are cleared through the Euroclear system.

To date, two more Kazak corporations have outlined their intentions to issue eurobonds: HSBK and a national electricity grid operator KEGOC. While HSBK had completed almost all of the procedures for issuing eurobond and stopped at the road-show stage, KEGOC was at an earlier stage when the Russian crisis began. As a result of Russian financial turmoil, both companies decided to postpone eurobond issues until the market situation improves. In the meantime, some other Kazak corporations are searching for opportunities to raise capital in the international capital markets. The most probable candidates include the national oil company Kazakoil, the oil pipeline operator Kazaktransoil, the national telecommunications company Kazakhtelecom, and a few others. However, all these plans were put "on hold" because of the unfavourable situation for borrowers from emerging markets on the international eurobond marketplace. If the situation changes, we estimate the potential level of new eurobond issues to be between USD 500 -800 million. Of those, roughly USD 300 million may be borrowed by Kazakstani banks.