The state's share in Uzbekistan's banking sector has fallen from roughly 85 percent to around 60 percent over the past several years, and the Central Bank intends to keep pushing that trend further, the Central Bank governor Timur Ishmetov said at the Silk Road Finance & Technology Forum in Tashkent Monday.
Ishmetov said that to attract investment, authorities would continue to prioritize macroeconomic stability and lower inflation.
"First and foremost, for investors, we will continue to ensure macroeconomic stability. We will keep bringing inflation down — to our target of 5 percent by next year," he said.
"The exchange rate will remain flexible and market-driven. The IMF recently reclassified our exchange rate regime as a floating one, and we intend to stick with that approach going forward," he said.
Ishmetov named further liberalization of the capital account — the gradual easing of restrictions on cross-border capital flows, including outbound and inbound investment, transactions in financial assets, and other capital operations — as another priority for reform.
"We'll do this gradually and in the right sequence. With IMF support, we recently drew up a roadmap for how these reforms should proceed. Our goal is to strengthen institutions and improve safeguards and risk management alongside greater flexibility, so that we don't undermine stability," he said.
He also announced a three-year program to overhaul banking sector regulation, developed based on recommendations from the IMF and World Bank following last year's financial sector assessment.
"By the end of these three years, we aim to bring our regulatory framework fully in line with international standards — Basel III, a full transition of all banks to IFRS, and so on," he said.
Reducing the state's footprint in the banking sector will remain one of the central pillars of the reform agenda.
"And of course, another important area is that we will continue to increase the private sector's share in banking. Over the past several years, we've managed to cut the state's share in the banking sector from roughly 85 percent to around 60 percent, and we will keep pushing that trend," the central bank governor said.
At the opening of the forum, Ishmetov said Uzbekistan aims to attract $1 billion in foreign investment into its fintech sector and train 5,000 specialists by 2030. To that end, the Central Bank is launching a national fintech strategy, an innovation hub and a venture fund, and is preparing to pilot a possible digital currency model.
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