JPMorgan Chase & Co. and HSBC Holdings are among banks planning to compete for a role in the largest Saudi Arabian share sale in at least 12 years, according to five people with knowledge of the matter. The banks will vie with local lenders including Banque Saudi Fransi (BSFR) and Gulf International Bank to be appointed as financial adviser on the sale of a 15 percent stake […]
After a year of waiting, the man running what could be the biggest-ever technology IPO finally lost patience with Hong Kong. Joe Tsai, the Alibaba Group Holding executive in charge of plans for the highly anticipated deal, only abandoned hope of a Hong Kong listing in the last few weeks, according to people familiar with the matter. The company’s shareholding structure, giving senior managers sway over board […]
Dubai’s government will consider establishing the world’s first fully sharia-compliant export-import bank to promote the emirate’s foreign trade, the Department of Economic Development said on Wednesday. The bank would provide financing to companies involved in trade while helping them to reduce their risks and gain market access, the department said in a statement without giving details of the proposed institution’s structure or financing. Noor Investment Group, which […]
BlackRock Inc.’s Sam Vecht says investors are following the herd in selling emerging markets to invest in the most-developed economies, a strategy that has historically yielded “underwhelming” results. Investors “are selling emerging markets which have very low valuations, significant dividend yields but have underperformed in recent times,” Vecht, London-based manager at BlackRock Emerging Europe Trust Plc, said in e-mailed comments yesterday. In exchange, they’re buying assets in […]
Emaar Properties, developer of the world’s tallest tower, hired Morgan Stanley to advise on the sale of a 25 percent stake in its shopping malls and retail business after revenue at the unit surged. The company is also considering appointing a local bank as additional adviser on the secondary offering, Chairman Mohamed Alabbar said today in an interview in Dubai. Emaar is seeking to complete the deal […]
Russia’s economy is showing signs of a crisis, the government in Moscow said as the U.S. and the European Union announced sanctions over the country’s support for the Crimea region breaking away from Ukraine. “The situation in the economy bears clear signs of a crisis,” Deputy Economy Minister Sergei Belyakov said in Moscow yesterday. The cabinet needs to refrain from raising the fiscal burden on companies, which […]
Gary Dugan, chief investment officer for Asia and the Middle East at private bank Coutts, has resigned to take the CIO job at National Bank of Abu Dhabi , sources familiar with the matter told Reuters on Monday. A Coutts spokeswoman confirmed that Dugan had resigned without elaborating. NBAD declined to comment. Before Coutts, Dugan was CIO of Dubai’s Emirates NBD.-Reuters
As U.S. and European officials threaten sanctions in their face-off with Russia over Ukraine, Vladimir Putin’s $160 billion in oil and natural gas exports may be his most potent weapon to limit punitive measures. The U.S. and its European allies, set to meet today in Brussels, have few levers to deter Putin even as they warn Russia not to annex Crimea after a referendum in Ukraine’s southern […]
Within 18 months of leaving his trading job to open a lunchtime eatery at the Dubai financial center in 2011, Nabil Al Rantisi was back: selling stocks and rebuilding one of the city’s largest brokerages. “I saw my window of opportunity,” Rantisi, managing director of Mena Corp Financial Services LLC, said in a March 9 telephone interview from Dubai. “Things started picking up in September 2012. By […]
|By K Raveendran| The agreement for the roll-over of $20 billion debt between Abu Dhabi and Dubai is expected to help Dubai refinance some of the other upcoming debt maturities with confidence, which depended a lot on the successful resolution of repayments owed to Abu Dhabi government and the UAE central bank, and continue to spend heavily on the ongoing infrastructure development. Dubai has already approached creditors […]
Dubai refinanced $20 billion at a quarter of the original cost, freeing cash to service liabilities and fund expansion plans. The emirate rolled over $10 billion of bonds owed to the central bank and a loan of the same amount due to Abu Dhabi’s government, and will pay a fixed interest of 1 percent on both, according to a statement on state-run WAM news agency yesterday. The […]
Dubai is considering regulatory reforms to persuade more funds to base themselves in its financial centre, though industry experts believe that other parts of its investment environment may also need to change for the emirate to compete globally. The proposed rules would create a new class of funds in the Dubai International Financial Centre (DIFC) in an effort to attract asset managers, such as hedge funds and […]
Growing tension between the West and Russia ahead of Ukraine’s weekend referendum in Crimea pushed down stocks on major world markets on Friday and drove up buying of safe-haven gold and the yen. Financial markets watched nervously as the West increasingly talked about sanctions and Russia hit back with promises of retaliatory measures and displays of military prowess. The vote being held on Sunday by pro-Moscow authorities […]
Dubai property prices rose by almost 35 per cent last year, according to the latest Global House Price Index by a UK-based consultancy. Prices were just 25 per cent below their 2008 peak, it said. “Dubai recorded the largest annual rise in mainstream property prices with prices rising 15.3 per cent in the six-month period (Q2 to Q4 2013),” the report said. In February, JLL, a real […]
|By Rajhkumar K Shaaw and Santanu Chakraborty| For the first time in five years, Nilesh Dedhia is buying Indian stocks. The 48-year-old owner of a die-casting factory in Mumbai is among a growing number of local investors returning to the $1.2 trillion equity market on speculation national elections in May will deliver a government with the mandate to revive economic growth from a decade low. That optimism […]
The Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation sued 16 of the world’s largest banks on Friday, accusing them of colluding to suppress interest rates. The lawsuit, filed in the federal district court in New York, was the latest to accuse financial institutions of conspiring to manipulate Libor, or the London Interbank Offered Rate. The FDIC said the defendants’ conduct caused substantial losses to 38 banks that the U.S. regulator […]
|By TAP Staff| A private-public investment consortium has been formed to finance the establishment of the Ghana Commodity Exchange (GCX). Investment consortium partners include Ghana’s top tier financial institutions, Data Bank Agrifund Manager Ltd, Ecobank Ghana Ltd, UT Bank Ghana Ltd, as well as IFC, 8 Miles Fund and eleni, with minority stakeholding by the Government of Ghana. The consortium partners and the Government of Ghana have […]
Emirates, the world’s biggest airline by international passenger traffic, is seeking to raise about $2 billion from four loans to fund the purchase of planes, according to two people familiar with the matter. The Dubai government-owned carrier will pay interest of less than 200 basis points, or two percentage points, above the London interbank offered rate on the 12-year amortising loans, said one of the people, who […]
The world’s most-profitable banks have never been so unloved by stock investors. China’s four-biggest lenders, which reported $126 billion of earnings in the 12 months through September, sank to the lowest valuations on record in Hong Kong trading yesterday. The MSCI China Financials Index dropped to an almost decade low versus the global industry benchmark while the market value of Industrial & Commercial Bank of China Ltd., […]
Qatar’s tight rental market has made it the most expensive country to live in the GCC, according to a comprehensive analysis on the cost of living in the region. The report has found that in a like-for-like comparison of seven measures, Qatar came out the most expensive overall, followed by the UAE, Saudi, Bahrain, Oman and Kuwait. Qatar also emerged as the most expensive GCC nation for […]
Billionaire investor George Soros said Europe faces 25 years of Japanese-style stagnation unless politicians pursue further integration of the currency bloc and change policies that have discouraged banks from lending. While the immediate financial crisis that has plagued Europe since 2010 “is over,” it still faces a political crisis that has divided the region between creditor and debtor nations, Soros, 83, said in a Bloomberg Television interview […]
Pakistan’s rupee surged 5.2 percent this week, the best performance among world currencies, as the nation’s rising foreign reserves and improving economy buoyed investor confidence. The country’s currency stockpile climbed to $9.52 billion this week, Finance Minister Ishaq Dar said yesterday, from $8.3 billion at the end of 2013. The economy is on course to achieve the official target of 4.4 percent expansion in the year ending […]
Saudi Arabia’s drive to make Qatar abandon its embrace of the Muslim Brotherhood may founder because of the limited leverage the Saudis and their allies can exercise over the world’s richest country. Qatar traded more with Singapore in 2012 than it did with the three Gulf neighbors — Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates and Bahrain — that withdrew their ambassadors from Doha last week to protest […]
Asian shares cautiously rebounded from two-week lows on Thursday but gains were pared after disappointing retail sales and factory output data underscored investors’ concerns over slowdown in China. A standoff in Ukraine and a massive fall in copper prices in recent weeks also spooked investors, although a flat close on Wall Street and some positive data in Australia and Japan helped to cushion the blow. European shares […]
