The National Bank of Kazakhstan continues its cycle of base rate cuts, and analysts expect the regulator to lower it by 0.25–0.50 percentage points at its meeting on September 4, 2026. This follows from an analysis of the rhetoric of the Monetary Policy Committee (MPC), which focuses primarily on inflationary factors, reports infohub.kz.
As of early September 2026, inflation in Kazakhstan has been slowing for 11 consecutive months, and the population's inflationary expectations are at a multi-year low. Kursiv Research analyzed the frequency of factor mentions in the available summaries of discussions on rate decisions at MPC meetings of the National Bank of the Republic of Kazakhstan and attempted to predict the regulator's next decision.
Understanding the logic behind the base rate decision is important not only for investment decisions but also for assessing the effectiveness of the regulator's communication policy. Since 2025, the National Bank has published summaries of discussions, which have become a subject of study for analysts. By July 2026, 10 such documents had accumulated.
The research methodology included a content analysis of all summaries, dividing the arguments into 130 semantic passages and classifying them into four categories: inflation and inflationary expectations, demand and the fiscal sector, the external sector and the foreign exchange market, and lending and monetary policy conditions. A quantitative synthesis allowed calculating the frequency of factor mentions.
The analysis showed that passages about inflation dominate the summaries (63% of mentions). The peak of inflationary rhetoric occurred in August–November 2025, when the rate was raised to 18%. Domestic demand and fiscal policy account for 16% of mentions, lending and monetary conditions for 11%, and external factors and the exchange rate for 10%.
In September 2026, key factors favor a rate cut. Annual inflation slowed to 9.8% in August (from 10.2% in July), dropping below 10% for the first time since February 2025. Food prices and paid services also slowed. Core inflation declined from 12.8% in January to 11.8% in July.
Inflationary expectations of the population have improved: perceived inflation over the past 12 months fell to 11.4% (a minimum since January 2025), and expected inflation for the next 12 months was 12.1% — the lowest level since April 2021.
However, current indicators are still significantly above the target level of 5%. Uncertainty remains in the external sector, and fiscal policy is likely to remain expansionary despite government plans to reduce the budget deficit from 2.3% of GDP in 2027 to 0.4% in 2029. Therefore, a cautious rate cut of 0.25–0.50 percentage points is expected.