Expert Comments on Reported Export Data Discrepancies

Five million tons of Kazakhstan’s oil — the country’s most valuable resource — have seemingly vanished from official reports. Energy analyst Nurlan Zhumagulov commented on the situation, Orda.kz reports

Writing on his Telegram channel, the director of the public foundation Energy Monitor highlighted a peculiar trend: official statistics show oil exports have dropped to their lowest level since 2008. From January to April, Kazakhstan exported only 21.3 million tons of oil — a 12% decrease compared to the same period last year.

Considering that Tengiz, one of the country’s largest oil fields, recently underwent a long-awaited expansion, the trend stands out.

Theoretically, production should have risen, and so should exports.

Compared to the previous period, oil production in the country increased by 9% and amounted to 32.9 million tons (compared to 30.2 million tons in the four months of 2024),
 Zhumagulov stated.

In the first four months of 2025, another 4.7 million tons were sold on the domestic market. Still, the numbers don’t add up.

The discrepancy: 6.9 million tons.

We will write off one or two million tons as technological losses and the unstable gas condensate coefficient. But where did the five million tons of oil disappear to? Maybe they managed to build a huge oil storage facility during this short period? In general, there are substantial questions about the data from the Bureau of National Statistics. If the BNS data is correct, the country has officially started gray exports,
 Zhumagulov emphasized.

The discrepancy grows month by month. From January to March, the gap between the data of the Bureau of National Statistics (BNS) and the Situational and Analytical Center of the Fuel and Energy Complex (SATsTEK) reached 4.1 million tons.

Zhumagulov later reported that he had received an explanation regarding the mismatch — and potentially, the missing oil.

The cause appears to lie in the specifics of statistical accounting.

There is a time lag between the actual delivery of oil for export and its reflection in customs statistics. This ‘lag’ in the time of reflection in statistics is about three months. This is due to the fact that for the final declaration the exporter needs a full package of documents, which are formed after the shipment of the batch to the oil pipeline,
 he clarified.

If oil was shipped at the end of January but the customs declaration was filed only in April, the shipment will appear in the statistics for April, potentially explaining why the export figures appear delayed and misaligned with actual production. The numbers may start to align in future reports.

Not all concerns have been addressed, however.

And the full story behind the "missing" oil remains unresolved.

Let’s assume that our tax authorities will wait up to three months for the country’s breadwinners (unlikely). But how can we explain the difference in oil supplies to the domestic market? According to BNS, 4.7 million tons of oil were sold to the domestic market in the first four months of 2025. According to SATsTEK/Ministry of Energy, 6.4 million tons of oil were sold. Is there a time lag of up to three months for the domestic market as well?
 asks Zhumagulov.

Orda.kz has previously reported on irregularities in Kazakhstan’s oil export data.  

Original Author: Nikita Drobny