George Osborne, the former UK chancellor, is to join BlackRock, the world’s largest asset manager, as an adviser. BlackRock’s chairman and chief executive Larry Fink said the company wanted Mr Osborne’s “unique and valuable perspective on the issues affecting the world”, citing his work helping the UK and the G20 to recover from the financial crisis. “At the centre of our mission is helping people around the […]
Kabir Mulchandani is a hands-on developer. While he may not be laying bricks, the SKAI Holdings CEO forwent his air-conditioned office in Downtown Dubai for an often stinking hot construction site on the Palm Jumeirah for the two years that it took for his flagship $1.2 billion hotel to be built. It was only in November that he finally walked offsite when the Viceroy Dubai Palm Jumeirah […]
IBM wrapped up 2016 with a better-than-expected fourth quarter earnings report Thursday, despite seeing revenue drop for the 19th consecutive quarter. CES 2017 recap Big trends, top products, and wackiest tech On the CNET Stage at CES 2017, ZDNet and TechRepublic editors wrapped up the show with a discussion of the most important trends and product categories at this year’s CES. The company reported net income of […]
“Comeback is a good word, man,” noted the actor Mickey Rourke, after portraying a washed-up wrestler led to a career renaissance. Could 2017 be the year when stockpickers can say the same thing? The post-financial crisis environment has been unkind to active investing, especially in equities, with most portfolio managers unable to beat their benchmarks even before costs. That has accelerated the seismic investor shift towards cheap, […]
The new UAE fire and life safety code is expected to be released on January 22 – but it will not be retrospective. Considering that upgrading the code was made more urgent by the alarming string of fires in existing residential buildings and the realisation that more than 1,000 buildings in the UAE still have a form of external cladding that is at high risk of rapidly […]
Friday 05.10 GMT Overview Equities markets were mixed in Asian trading on Friday as the dollar ceded ground to regional currencies and China reported on-target economic growth ahead of the inauguration of US President-elect Donald Trump. Hot topic The dollar index measuring the greenback against a basket of peers fell 0.2 per cent after a two-day winning streak left it 0.8 per cent higher at Thursday’s close. […]
By Kevin Yao and Elias Glenn | BEIJING BEIJING China’s economy grew a faster-than-expected 6.8 percent in the fourth quarter, boosted by higher government spending and record bank lending, giving it a solid tailwind heading into what is expected to be a turbulent 2017. But Beijing’s decision to raise spending to meet its official growth target could exact a high price, as policymakers grapple with financial risks […]
DUBAI/BEIRUT: Iran’s government and entities close to the elite Revolutionary Guards have signed major economic contracts with Syria, reaping what appear to be lucrative rewards for helping President Bashar Assad regain control of parts of his country from rebels.An opposition group condemned the telecommunications and mining deals signed with Iran, Damascus’s main regional ally, as “looting” of the Syrian people and the country’s wealth by the “Iranian […]
Investor optimism faded in the week preceding the inauguration of Donald Trump as US president, with equity funds suffering their largest outflows since the surprise result of November’s election. Close to $2.5bn fled US equity funds in the week ending Wednesday, according to data from EPFR Global, extending outflows of $250m from the prior week and demonstrating that the investor demand that drove more than $60bn of […]
Western Union agreed on Thursday to forfeit $586m after admitting that it violated US anti-money laundering laws by ignoring evidence that thousands of its agents were involved in sending illicit cash to criminals, including human traffickers in China and bookies in Costa Rica, the US Department of Justice announced. From 2004 to 2012, Western Union, a global money services business based in Englewood, Colorado, “processed hundreds of […]
By Richard Martin | BARCELONA BARCELONA Spanish third-tier team CD Tudelano have taken the unusual step of appointing Scottish businessman John Clarkson as coach on an 18-month contract without a salary, the club said on Thursday. Clarkson, who owns a care home business in East Anglia, takes over a side who are ninth in Group 1 of the regionalized Second Division B. The 60-year-old has previous experience […]
19th January 2017 Profile Software, an international financial solutions provider, today announced its sponsorship of the Middle East Wealth Management Forum organized by Hubbis, taking place on the 24th of January at the Ritz Carlton, DIFC in Dubai, UAE. Profile’s executives will demonstrate the client centric and innovative platforms that address the Wealth Management industry’s requirements. Profile supports thought provoking industry leading events for the Wealth Management […]
Submitted by Peter Schiff via Euro Pacific Capital, There is much we don’t know about how the Trump presidency will play out. Will the Wall get built? Who will pay for it? Will it have at least some fencing? Will repeal and replace happen at exactly the same time? Will Trump throw a ceremonial switch? Will there be a Trump National Golf Course in Sochi? It’s anyone’s […]
Puerto Rico and its creditors have returned to the bargaining table this week as newly-elected governor Ricardo Rosselló seeks to reset negotiations after an acrimonious two years between the island and its bondholders. Mr Rosselló, who was elected in November last year to the US territory’s highest public office, said in an interview with the Financial Times on Thursday that he wanted to take a “philosophical shift” […]
Oman Air is more than double its contribution to the country’s gross domestic product this year to OR900 million ($2.3 billion) as it seeks to continue expansion of its fleet and network. The national carrier will tell its staff at its global conference in Muscat on Thursday that it increased its GDP contribution in 2016 by 6 percent to OR415 million. The increase came in the context […]
Steven Mnuchin, Donald Trump’s nominee to be Treasury secretary, clashed with Democrats over the business practices of the lender he once chaired, saying he had been wrongly accused of taking advantage of unfortunate borrowers and that he would work “tirelessly” to boost the economy and US hiring. The former banker told the Senate finance committee that he had been maligned and that OneWest, the bank, had extended 100,000 […]
Appoints Industry Veteran Amid Al-Shanteer to Lead Regional Office in Dubai Covering Middle East and North Africa 19 January 2017 FREMONT, Calif.–(BUSINESS WIRE/ME NewsWire) Responding to growing business in the Middle East and North Africa, AlertEnterprise, the leading Silicon Valley based provider of Security Convergence software, has appointed Amid Al-Shanteer as Vice President of Sales for the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) market effective January 16, […]
Brussels is seeking to defuse a regulatory time-bomb facing Europe’s pensions as the retirement industry warns that EU derivatives reforms scheduled for 2018 could cost savers billions. The European Commission is preparing legislation to amend regulations that are seen hurting pensions funds by forcing them to put aside higher amounts of money to satisfy derivatives rules. Trades such as swaps and other derivatives require support in the […]
By Anjuli Davies and Andrew MacAskill | LONDON LONDON Global banks have begun signaling how they will put plans into action to cope with a “hard” exit by Britain from the European Union. Until now, banks have considered varying degrees of upheaval to their British-based businesses, depending on whether the outcome of Brexit was “hard” or “soft.” But after Prime Minister Theresa May said that Britain would […]
January 19, 2017 by: Claire Jones in Frankfurt The European Central Bank has kept interest rates at record lows and the terms of its landmark quantitative easing package unchanged as its president prepares to field questions on an economic outlook full of threats. The bank’s governing council, meeting on Thursday in Frankfurt, left its benchmark main refinancing rate at zero. Its deposit rate, in effect a levy […]
Etihad Airways is not looking to take a stake in German carrier Lufthansa, a spokesman said on Wednesday, denying a report in an Italian newspaper that sent Lufthansa’s shares higher on Tuesday. “We can confirm that are not looking to take a financial stake in Lufthansa,” the spokesman said, after the Wall Street Journal quoted Etihad Aviation Group CEO James Hogan as saying he was interested in […]
SAN FRANCISCO/NEW YORK This past November, Nasdaq Inc (NDAQ.O) hired a helicopter to film Manhattan’s skyline using Snapchat’s new video-camera sunglasses and sent the aerial footage to its social media followers. The New York Stock Exchange – its arch-rival – on the same day tweeted a video shot from the floor of its exchange, showing that it too was using the social media giant’s gadget. The scramble […]
If this week’s speech by Theresa May on her Brexit plans was designed to reassure the City of London and stop banks from shifting jobs out of the UK, early indications are that it appears to have failed. The prime minister is scheduled to address business leaders at the annual World Economic Forum in Davos Thursday morning, but in the meantime a flurry of senior financiers popped […]
Qatar Islamic Bank (QIB), the Gulf state’s largest sharia-compliant lender by assets, met analysts’ average forecast as it reported a 2 percent rise in fourth-quarter net profit on Wednesday, according to Reuters calculations. It made a net profit of 555 million riyals ($152 million)during the three months to Dec. 31, compared with 544 million riyals in the same period a year earlier, Reuters calculated from financial statements […]
