More than 40 state companies to pay dividends to Azerbaijani state budget in 2027 compared to 3-4 previously

BAKU. Oct 22 (Interfax) - More than 40 state companies will pay dividends to Azerbaijan's state budget in 2027 for the first time, Finance Minister Sahil Babayev said.

"In Azerbaijan, for the first time more than 40 state companies [or companies with state participation] will pay dividends to the state budget next year. Their total amount will exceed 900 million manat [$529.4 million at the current exchange rate]," Babayev said on Thursday at the Digital Financial Ecosystem: A New Stage in Management conference.

In Azerbaijan, no more than three to four state companies paid dividends annually. As reported, Azerbaijan's state budget for 2026 envisages dividend income from state enterprises at the level of 600 million manat ($353 million at the current exchange rate). Most of these dividends will come from the State Oil Company of the Azerbaijani Republic (SOCAR) and the International Bank of Azerbaijan, the largest in the country.

The Finance Ministry has created a special reporting portal for monitoring the activities of state companies and improving their dividend policy, Babayev said at the conference.

"[A total of] 1,113 enterprises have registered on this portal and submitted 11,434 reports. As a result, budget reports have been obtained from 950 state companies, and the preparation of dividend forecasts for 885 enterprises has been completed," he said.

As reported, from 2027, the Finance Ministry will introduce a practice obliging state enterprises to pay at least 30% of net profit to the state budget as dividends.

As reported, on December 29, 2025, Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev approved the rules for distributing net profit and the general parameters of the dividend policy of legal entities in state ownership, legal entities whose controlling stake/shares belongs to the state and public legal entities.

State enterprises will be exempt from the need to pay dividends to the state budget if their net profit for the reporting year is below 100,000 manat. For a number of state companies (from the transport sector and security sphere), this norm is reduced to 20,000 manat.

The objectives of adopting these rules are: determining the dividend income of state enterprises, ensuring the compliance of the state enterprise's activities with the social and economic interests of the state, stimulating effective and profitable activities of state enterprises, ensuring long-term development and maintaining the financial stability of the state enterprise, and ensuring the optimal distribution of net profit.

By May 1, the Finance Ministry will send the state enterprise a letter on preparing forecasts of dividend payments to the state budget for the next year and the corresponding reporting forms. In turn, based on the actual indicators of the previous reporting year, by July 1 of the current year the enterprise submits to the Finance Ministry information on the forecasted indicators for dividend payments for the next year.

Previously, there were no norms in the country regulating dividend payments by state companies. The government made decisions on an individual basis regarding which enterprise would pay dividends and in what amount.

The official exchange rate on October 22 is 1.7 manat/$1.