Financial Technologies (India) Ltd. slumped by its trading limit in Mumbai after Chairman Jignesh Shah was arrested by the police as part of an investigation into the biggest payment default in India’s commodity market. The shares fell 5 percent to 276.30 rupees, the lowest close since Feb. 13. Multi Commodity Exchange of India Ltd. (MCX), in which Financial Technologies owns 26 percent stake, declined 6.7 percent to […]
Dubai’s bourse has outpaced other Gulf markets by a wide margin in terms of companies’ first-quarter profit growth, data show, supporting its position as the top performer in the region. The emirate’s benchmark soared 108 percent last year and is up 57 percent this year, making it one of the world’s top-performing stock markets over the past 17 months. Although some analysts believe the market is overbought, […]
Saudi Arabia’s stock exchange plans to sell shares in an initial public offering as the Arab world’s largest bourse seeks to gradually open up to foreigners and boost institutional investment. Tadawul, as the gauge is known, will hire advisers soon for the share sale, Chief Executive Officer Adel Al Ghamdi said at a conference in Riyadh today. That would make it the second market in the Gulf […]
The one-time White House intern whose affair with President Bill Clinton led to his impeachment in the US Senate has broken her long silence in the media. In Vanity Fair magazine, Monica Lewinsky, 40, writes that she deeply regrets the fling. The president “took advantage” of her, she writes, though she describes their relationship as consensual. In 1998, Republicans failed in their effort to oust him from […]
|Nicole Arce| Facebook is at the front and center of what could turn out to be an ugly legal battle after ZeniMax Media, parent company of Id Software, sent the social network a legal notice claiming at least part of the intellectual property rights to Rift, a virtual reality headset developed by Oculus VR. In March of this year, Facebook shook up the technology industry by announcing its […]
As Dubai freight-forwarding firm Able Logistics Group began preparing early this year to go public, it conducted a leveraged recapitalisation, taking on fresh bank debt so it could pay a cash dividend to shareholders. By the standards of developed Western markets, the transaction was routine. But for the Middle East it was an unusually creative deal, a sign that the region’s private equity industry is finally building […]
It looks sleek, thin and premium, but its price is anything but the latter. OnePlus One smartphone is creating a buzz online as a budget smartphone killer since it was rolled out on April 23, and people are definitely hungry for it. During its first launch, One smartphone was initially available in countries such as Austria, Canada, Belgium, Denmark, France, Finland, Germany, the Netherlands, Portugal, Italy, Spain, […]
Dubai shares jumped the most since January after first-quarter earnings boosted investor sentiment. Qatar’s gauge also advanced. The DFM General Index (DFMGI) surged 3.3 percent, the biggest jump since Jan. 23, to 5,247.29 at the close. The measure has soared 56 percent this year, making it the best performer among more than 90 benchmarks tracked by Bloomberg. Dubai Islamic Bank advanced 5.5 percent after first-quarter profit more […]
|By Nicole Blackmore| Is Dubai the new Spain? Britons are abandoning their place in the Spanish sun for countries with better work opportunities and more stable house prices – and the Middle East is one of several areas attracting growing numbers of emigrants. While Dubai may not be a popular retirement option given the high cost of living, young professionals are moving there in droves. NatWest’s latest […]
The United Arab Emirates will have its own stand-alone exchange-traded funds with this week’s launch of the iShares MSCI UAE Capped ETF (UAE). On May 30th, both Qatar and the UAE will get promoted by the MSCI index folks being frontier markets to becoming full-fledged emerging markets. As of this year’s first quarter, the UAE and Qatar occupied the second- and third-largest country weights in the MSCI […]
Abu Dhabi government-owned General Holding Corporation (Senaat) has shelved plans for a stock market debut, four sources aware of the matter said, as the emirate takes a cautious line on financial commitments in the wake of its bailout of Dubai. Despite enjoying significant hydrocarbon wealth, the largest of the seven United Arab Emirates has been wary of its financial position since providing Dubai with a $20 billion […]
All markets in the Gulf edged up on Thursday, led by Saudi Arabia which rose to a six-year high on the back of petrochemicals and cement makers. The kingdom’s main index gained 0.8 percent to 9,660 points, its highest close since June 2008. Saudi Basic Industries Corp (SABIC), up 2.6 percent, was the main support, also topping daily turnover. Overall, Saudi petrochemicals gained 1.5 percent while cement […]
Dana Gas Islamic bond was the best-performing dollar sukuk in the world last month as the energy company’s rising stock price prompted investors to exchange their debt into shares at a profit. The fuel producer’s $425 million convertible bond due October 2017 made 3.46 percent last month, compared with an average 0.41 percent return for all dollar-denominated sukuk, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. The share conversion […]
NEW DELHI (Reuters) – New Delhi has asked the European Union to lift a ban on Indian mangoes, as the country has already addressed the issue cited by the 28-nation bloc in a clampdown on shipments from next month. The EU informed India in March that shipments of premium Alphonso mangoes would be blocked from May until December 2015 after authorities in Brussels found consignments infested with […]
When French wine and cognac bottle maker Saverglass decided to expand three years ago, it chose a relatively remote, less affluent location in the United Arab Emirates for its plant rather than the business hubs of Dubai and Abu Dhabi. The company sited its 75 million euro ($105 million) factory, which produces some 400,000 bottles a day, in the desert emirate of Ras Al Khaimah, an hour’s […]
Middle East fund managers have become more cautious about stock markets in the United Arab Emirates because of concern that Dubai may be overheating, a monthly Reuters survey shows. The survey of 15 leading investment managers, conducted over the past 10 days, found they are still bullish about the region’s stock markets in general: 33 percent expect to increase their Middle East equity allocations in the next […]
|By TAP Staff| Gulf-based borrowers, who have been returning to the international debt market in recent days after several months of relatively light issuance, are reporting strong investor interest. Amid geopolitical tensions in Ukraine and economic instability in some emerging markets, Gulf economies have stood out because of their stability, thanks to their trade and state budget surpluses. The contrast appears to created attractive conditions for them […]
Twitter Inc on Tuesday reported 255 million monthly active users, up 5.8 percent from the previous quarter but not enough to satisfy investors increasingly concerned about its struggle to gain a mass following. Twitter’s stock fell nearly 10 percent after hours, to below its post-initial public offering low of $38.80 on November 25. The San Francisco-based company also said viewers refreshed their “timelines” – Twitter’s equivalent of […]
Emaar Properties is talking to regulators about the possibility of listing its shopping malls unit on Dubai Financial Market (DFM), the emirate’s main bourse, instead of Nasdaq Dubai, sources aware of the matter said on Monday. Last month, Dubai’s biggest property firm hired Morgan Stanley to manage an 8-9 billion dirham ($2.2-2.5 billion) listing of the unit, which would be one of the biggest equity deals in […]
London-based RiverCrossing Capital Partners, a new Islamic investment firm, has launched its first product, a U.S. real estate fund, as part of a plan to offer non-traditional asset classes to institutional investors in the Gulf. The firm will develop asset-based funds with a non-cyclical nature, a departure from other sharia-compliant real estate funds which have focused on more traditional commercial and residential properties that perform in line […]
A sense of euphoria can be felt as you walk onto the Dubai Financial Market’s (DFM) trading floor. Excited investors sit huddled at tables, eyes fixed on trading screens. Occasionally the floor erupts in applause as certain stocks shoot up to target levels. A local investor in his fifties who gives his name as Abu Hany, dressed in the traditional white robes of the Gulf, describes himself […]
Reuters | Jim Finkle – BOSTON, April 27 (Reuters) – Microsoft Corp is rushing to fix a bug in its widely used Internet Explorer web browser after a computer security firm disclosed the flaw over the weekend, saying hackers have already exploited it in attacks on some U.S. companies. PCs running Windows XP will not receive any updates fixing that bug when they are released, however, because Microsoft […]
An Abu Dhabi state-owned fund is financing a quarter of Etisalat’s 4.2 billion euro purchase of Vivendi’s stake in Maroc Telecom, said three bank sources with knowledge of the deal, adding it should close this week. The identity of the fund is a closely-guarded secret. The banks that will provide the remaining 3.15 billion euros of loan finance have not been told which of the emirate’s state-owned […]
Buyers are lining up for Germany-based packaging group Mauser with final bids due to be submitted on Monday, banking sources said on Friday. The sale of Mauser by Dubai International Capital (DIC) could fetch around 1.25 billion euros ($1.73 billion), one of the banking sources said. At this price, the sale would be one of the largest asset disposals by the emirate since its debt crisis in […]
