#kaspi

Gruzja (2) (3) (4) by Lukasz Krawczynski

Via Flickr:

Кайшика жёстко разносит в автобусе 😭

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Кста, я художница из Казахстана★

Если заинтересованы в заказе и у вас есть Kaspi Gold — можете написать в личку;)

A few things worth knowing about the Kazakh tech and remote-work scene that don't get much coverage in English-language media:

Astana International Financial Centre (AIFC) operates under English common law — yes, in the middle of Central Asia. The legal framework attracts fintech and crypto operations, and the working language inside AIFC companies is functionally English. Tech salaries inside AIFC for senior backend or fintech roles run 30,000-55,000 USD equivalent — modest by Western standards but combined with Almaty/Astana cost of living, it's a strong disposable-income story.

Almaty has built a genuine startup ecosystem. Kaspi (the dominant Kazakh fintech, listed on NASDAQ) anchors a much larger ecosystem than most observers realize. CoLab, MOST Hub, and Astana Hub host accelerator programs that have produced regionally significant exits. International tech companies — Yandex, In-Driver (originally Russian, now Kazakh-headquartered), and Glovo — have substantial Almaty engineering presence.

Remote work for Western companies is the dominant pattern for senior tech. Kazakh developers with strong English routinely work for US, UK, and German employers at 60-90% of local Western salaries — which translates to extraordinary purchasing power locally. Astana Hub's Digital Nomad framework supports this legally for tax purposes.

Russian relocation has reshaped the talent market. Since 2022, an estimated 200,000+ Russian tech workers relocated to Kazakhstan (and Georgia, Armenia, Uzbekistan). Almaty's tech talent pool is now meaningfully deeper than it was three years ago, with concentrated pockets of senior engineers from Yandex, Avito, Tinkoff, and similar.

Cost of living advantage is substantial. A senior software engineer earning 4,000-6,000 USD/month in Almaty typically lives better than someone earning 2-3x that in Berlin or London. 1BR central Almaty rent runs 400-700 USD; a meal at a good restaurant 10-15 USD; quality public services and infrastructure.

The trade-offs are real — the language of business and government is increasingly Kazakh (not Russian), winters are extreme, and career mobility within Kazakhstan plateaus quickly for senior tech (you'll likely move to Western remote work or relocate within 5-7 years).

For someone optimizing on disposable income with willingness to live regionally, it's a genuinely interesting market. To browse Kazakh tech and remote opportunities, aggregating across HeadHunter.kz, LinkedIn, and Astana Hub's job board produces meaningfully different results than relying on any single source.