The continuous trouble over the delay in the Kashagan development has seen a few new developments over the last week. The 22 October deadline after which talks between the consortium and the Kazakh government about the stalemate should have originally been resolved got extended.

“The parties agreed to continue negotiations beyond the 22nd of October in a spirit of positive and constructive cooperation,” the energy ministry said in a joint statement with Kazakh state oil company KazMunaiGas.

One big hurdle on the way to an initial settlement seemed to be US oil giant ExxonMobil, which blocked the expansion of state-owned Kazmunaigaz’s share. This would mean that the consortium members (ENI, RDS, XoM, Total, Conoco-Philips, Inpex) would see their shares in the mega-project dwindle.

So, what’s the story here? With costs rising beyond the $100bn threshold and their shares in the project falling, will the international supermajors still see a solid return on their investment while at the same time the Kazakh government is happy?

Only time will answer that question. But one should remember that Kashagan really is an exceptional oilfield. Its peak production will lie well beyond one million barrels of oil per day, and reserves will last for a long time.

The oil price with which the majors are producing their forecasts are rather conservative. But oil will most likely be more expensive in the long run, and oil from Kashagan thus more profitable than currently projected. In the end, everyone is likely to win, even if the shares of the big oil companies decrease slightly.

In the meanwhile, what will happen to Kazakhstan’s macroeconomic position? Projections of 3.5 million barrels of exported oil by 2015 were the basis of many long-term development strategies in Astana circles. This figure of course has to be revised downwards. And it might be a good thing that Kazakhstan will reap the benefits of its subsurface resources more slowly, more gradually.

The economy has shown many signs of overheating recently and the financial sector caught a pretty hefty cold. The delay in Kashagan might turn out quite well for Nazarbayev’s and Masimov’s legacies: KMG will see its shares in Kashagan rise (making more money when it finally goes onstream) and its expertise in frontier-technology projects grow.

The government will receive more digestable windfalls over the years and will receive these for longer, securing sizeable income until the well into the 21st century.