🇰🇿 Regulator1 Jan 2025
Astana International Financial Centre updates its company rules: registered email, director changes, simpler strike-off
Amendments to the Astana International Financial Centre's legal entities framework took effect on 1 January 2025. AIFC companies must keep a registered email address and notify the Registrar of director changes, including residential and email addresses, and resigning directors must notify too. Non-operating companies can be struck off without a liquidator, shareholder registers must be kept in the AIFC, and the Registrar can require inconsistencies in filed documents to be fixed.
The AIFC in Astana has its own English-law-based company regulations, administered by the Astana Financial Services Authority (AFSA) and the AIFC Registrar of Companies.
What changed from 1 January 2025
- Registered email: every registered entity must keep a current registered email address and notify the Registrar of changes.
- Directors: companies must notify the Registrar of changes to the register of directors, including a director's residential and email address, and a resigning director must notify the Registrar too.
- Strike-off: a non-operating company can apply for simplified strike-off without appointing a liquidator, or use voluntary winding up.
- Registers: the register of shareholders must be kept in the AIFC, even where an agent maintains it. Public companies may keep a branch register overseas.
- Registrar's powers: the Registrar can require a company to resolve inconsistencies in documents it has filed.
- Securities: public companies need no written transfer instrument for securities traded and settled on AFSA-recognised exchanges, no independent valuation for non-cash allotments of 5% or less of share capital, and private companies need no Registrar approval for public debt offerings through AFSA-licensed exchanges. Annual accounts can be sent to shareholders by email.
Who is affected
AIFC companies and their directors, corporate service providers and company secretaries.