Microsoft Corp’s new Chief Executive Officer, Satya Nadella, finally unveiled Office for Apple Inc’s iPad in a polished debut that set him apart from his energetic predecessor while signaling his plans to make mobile apps the top priority at the world’s largest software company. At a news conference Thursday, executives demonstrated a new “touch-first” version of Office crafted for the iPad, available for download as a free […]
SpiceJet Ltd., the Indian budget carrier headed for its third straight annual loss, said it sees little chance of luring investment soon amid elevated debt and intensifying competition. Although the airline’s owners have injected more than 5 billion rupees ($83 million) in equity in recent quarters, that “has not been adequate” to reduce the carrier’s dependence on debt, S.L. Narayanan, the chief financial officer of SpiceJet’s parent […]
|By TAP Staff| Fitch Rating sees RAKBANK’s viability rate (VR) constrained by its fairly small franchise rising credit risk exposure due to its expansion in unsecured SME lending and pressure on liquidity from a wide asset-liability maturity mismatch. The bank accounts for only 2 percent of the UAE banking assets, it notes. According to Fitch, RAKBANK’s viability rating could be negatively affected if the bank’s expansion in […]
Citigroup Inc.’s capital plan was among five that failed Federal Reserve stress tests, while Goldman Sachs Group Inc. and Bank of America Corp. passed only after reducing their requests for buybacks and dividends. Citigroup, as well as U.S. units of Royal Bank of Scotland Group Plc, HSBC Holdings Plc and Banco Santander SA, failed because of qualitative concerns about their processes, the Fed said today in a […]
Hanco, a Saudi Arabian auto rental company, said it acquired U.A.E.-based Byrne Investments from a private-equity group previously owned by HSBC Holdings Plc (HSBA) for 600 million dirhams ($163 million). Hanco, majority-owned by closely-held Bin Sulaiman Holdings, is buying Byrne’s equipment rental operations and modular building services business from Dubai-based Havenvest Private Equity Middle East Partnership, it said today in a statement. Persian Gulf companies are stepping […]
A US federal appeals court upheld the conviction of former Goldman Sachs Group Inc director Rajat Gupta, one of the biggest successes in federal prosecutors’ long-running probe to stop insider trading on Wall Street. The 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals rejected Gupta’s claim that wiretap evidence should not have been admitted to show that he leaked news about Goldman’s finances, including a crucial investment by Warren […]
Private equity firm Ithmar Capital, which manages over $800 million in investments, expects to close deals worth at least 1 billion dirhams ($270 million) this year as economies in the Gulf continue to recover from the global financial crisis, its top executive said on Monday. The Dubai-based firm, founded in 2005, invests in growth and buyout opportunities in Gulf-based or related companies. “We expect to do deals […]
|By K Raveendran| Samena Capital, an investment firm founded by Shirish Saraf, a former colleague of Arif Naqwi in Abraaj Capital, is in talks to buy as much as 50 percent of RAK Ceramics, the world’s biggest maker of ceramic tiles, according to two people familiar with the matter. Established in 2008, Samena Capital focuses on the Subcontinent, Asia, Middle East and North Africa, collectively the SAMENA […]
Dubai Investments, a diversified manufacturer and investor in property, plans to increase the limit on foreign ownership of its shares to 35 percent of its total capital, the company said on Sunday. Foreign investors now hold 13.7 percent of Dubai Investments’ shares out of the total 20 percent allowed, bourse data shows. The firm’s shareholders, including sovereign fund Investment Corp of Dubai which has an 11.5 percent […]
Private equity firm Clayton Dubilier & Rice LLC (CD&R) is the frontrunner among four bidders for Germany-based, but Dubai-owned, packaging group Mauser, Britain’s Sky News reported on its website on Saturday, without citing its sources. People familiar with the auction told Reuters earlier this month that the private equity arm of Dubai Holding had asked buyout groups to submit binding bids for Mauser, after putting on hold […]
Wall Street leaders including Lloyd Blankfein and James Gorman, who have courted business in Vladimir Putin’s Russia, are facing a dilemma as tensions over Ukraine escalate. Their scheduled attendance at Putin’s annual investor showcase in St. Petersburg in May is in doubt as sanctions imposed by the U.S. in response to Russia’s annexation of Crimea — and retaliatory moves by Putin — threaten the ties between Russia’s […]
Bank of America Corp. (BAC)’s Merrill Lynch unit is hiring the head of VTB Capital’s Middle East cash-equity sales and sales trading in Dubai, Karim Nsouli, two people familiar with the matter said. Nsouli will take over from Veer Ramlugon, who handled Middle East equity and equity-derivatives for BofA Merrill Lynch in Dubai, the people said yesterday, asking not to be identified because the matter is private. […]
Buyout firm GrowthGate Capital plans to take freight-forwarding company Able Logistics Group public in Dubai around the end of this year, a senior GrowthGate executive told Reuters, in a sign of growing strength in the region’s equity markets. “We aim to make it this year or early next year,” Haythem Macki, a partner at GrowthGate, said. “The market is ready for it – there’s a lot of […]
Junior bankers in the United Arab Emirates are reaping almost 36 percent more salary than their counterparts in London, with bonuses almost double those paid in the U.K. capital, compensation data provider Emolument said. Fixed salaries at the analyst level in the U.A.E. average $91,000, compared with $73,000 in London, the group said in an e-mailed statement. Bonuses in the U.A.E., which consists of sheikhdoms including Dubai […]
Two Abu Dhabi lenders have emerged as frontrunners to buy most of Barclays’ retail banking operations in the United Arab Emirates (UAE), with a final decision expected next month after a competitive bidding process, banking sources said on Wednesday. Abu Dhabi Commercial Bank and Abu Dhabi Islamic Bank are vying to take control of the assets, the sources said, after the British lender said in September it […]
|Blaise Robinson| Reuters| Traders work on the floor of the New York Stock Ex Traders work on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange February 3, 2014. REUTERS/Brendan McDermid A Reuters’ poll of economists shows non-farm payrolls are expected to have grown by 185,000 last month, snapping back from December’s three-year low. “Following the surprisingly weak figure for December, investors’ expectations are quite low this time, so […]
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 […]
Abu Dhabi, drawing lessons from Japan’s Fukushima nuclear disaster, is building “gold-standard” safety procedures into its plan to develop four nuclear reactors, a foreign adviser to the government said. The United Arab Emirates, of which Abu Dhabi is the capital, is investing in facilities for nuclear power, renewable energy and liquefied natural gas to cut its reliance on oil. The U.A.E. will be the first Arab state […]
Competition is hotting up among low-cost carriers in the Persian Gulf. That’s according to analysts at NBK Capital, who say government-owned FlyDubai’s aggressive expansion is having a negative impact on publically-listed Air Arabia at its Sharjah hub. FlyDubai and Air Arabia already overlap on 40 destinations from their respective airports, which are just a short drive away from each other. In total, Air Arabia offers 70 destinations […]
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 […]
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 […]
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 […]
|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 […]
