Tashkent, Uzbekistan (UzDaily.uz) — Uzbekistan’s State Assets Management Agency (SAMA) has commented for the first time on the privatisation of payment organisation Paynet, which was not preceded by a public announcement. SAMA Director Sohibjon Murodov disclosed the details at a press conference on 8 October.
According to Murodov, the privatisation of Paynet followed a procedure explicitly provided for by law: the pre-emptive right of a company’s participants to purchase a stake.
The head of SAMA explained that, under Uzbekistan’s Law on Limited Liability Companies, when one participant intends to sell their stake, they must first offer it to the other participants or to the company itself.
Murodov also said SAMA was changing its approach to disclosing information about transactions involving the exercise of pre-emptive rights to purchase stakes in companies’ charter capital. He said the agency intends to inform the public about such transactions in the future.
How Paynet’s ownership changed
In April 2024, Uzpaynet, the company operating the Paynet payment service, changed its founder.
According to registry data, 100% of the company was transferred to New Industrial Technologies. The sale of the state-owned stake was not officially announced, although reports of the ownership change had previously appeared on social media.
New Industrial Technologies was established in 2019 and has charter capital of 273.56 billion soums. Alex Lee owns 60% of the company, while the remaining 40% belongs to Mustafa Abdurakhmanov, who also serves as its head.
Abdurakhmanov owns 77.6% of Asia Alliance Group, the majority shareholder of Asia Alliance Bank.
The government had previously attempted to privatise Uzpaynet. In August 2022, SAMA announced the sale of the state’s entire 100% stake in the company.
Seven applications from potential buyers were received over the following month. However, the submission of bids was postponed to allow for “additional clarification”.
