Kazakhstan needs nuclear power if it is to overcome power shortages caused partly by the boom in cryptocurrency “mining”, the country’s president Kassym-Jomart Tokayev told bankers at a meeting in the capital, Nur-Sultan.

Mr Tokayev said “we are already feeling the first signs of power shortages in Kazakhstan” – adding this was in part due to the rapid increase in electricity-hungry cryptocurrency mining this year.

Reports have said Kazakhstan’s share of the global cryptocurrency mining market has quadrupled over the past year, making it the second largest mining hub in the world after the US.