Happier days: Nick Clegg and David Cameron in 2010 agree to form a coalition government Photo: Getty Images Just before the general election, the Conservatives released a party political broadcast warning that a coalition would bring disaster. “Under-the-table deals will be the order of the day,” we were told. The fate awaiting savers was depicted by a hammer smashing a piggy bank. The process of proper government would […]
General Motors Co said on Thursday it has issued five more recalls, covering almost 3 million vehicles globally, and is expected to take a charge of up to $200 million. Still dealing with fallout from the recall of defective ignition switches linked to at least 13 deaths, the No. 1 U.S. automaker said the largest of the latest recalls covers more than 2.7 million cars for tail […]
King Abdullah appointed a son, Prince Turki bin Abdullah, as governor of Riyadh Province on Wednesday, strengthening his branch of the ruling dynasty as it approaches a difficult decision on how to transfer power to the next generation. Another son, Prince Mishaal bin Abdullah, was made governor of Mecca Province months ago. The line of succession does not pass directly from father to son but has moved […]
Dubai is set to become a smart city in the next three years, which would see a thousand government services going smart along with other changes that will make daily life of the residents smoother. There will be service booths in public places like malls equipped with video conferencing, document scanning and printing services so that people can complete almost all paperwork without visiting any of the […]
Samsung Electronics Co Chairman Lee Kun Hee, who leads Asia’s biggest technology company and helps generate about a quarter of South Korea’s economic output, remains in stable condition after emergency surgery following a heart attack. Lee, 72, is at Samsung Medical Center in Seoul after being resuscitated following an acute myocardial infarction, Rhee So Eui, a spokeswoman for Samsung Group, said in an e-mailed statement. Lee, who […]
If you are looking for an explanation as to why crude oil prices in Asia aren’t lower, then the blame rests squarely with Chinese stockpiling. China’s record imports of 6.78 million barrels per day (bpd) in April give the impression that oil demand is roaring ahead, but the reality is that almost half a million bpd is being put into storage tanks. The authorities don’t officially disclose […]
Gold fell to its weakest in a week early on Monday as the euro hovered near a one-month low on fears of policy action from the European Central Bank, but the metal recovered some losses on safe-haven demand over escalating violence in Ukraine. Spot gold eased 0.2 percent to $1,286.40 an ounce by 0313 GMT, after dropping to a one-week low of $1,279.60 earlier in the session. […]
The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) says it plans to clamp down on beef exports if it takes power after general elections that end on Monday, threatening supplies from one of the world’s biggest shippers of the meat. Surprisingly in a country where so many view cows as sacred, India has been poised to become the No.1 beef exporting nation, supplying markets such as Malaysia, Thailand, Vietnam and […]
The Dubai business community has been significantly more optimistic during the first quarter of 2014, compared to the same period of the previous year. Optimism is especially high among manufacturing and services firms, according to the quarterly business survey conducted by the Department of Economic Development. The composite Business Confidence Index for Dubai stood at 135.5 points in the first quarter of 2014, an increase of 22.4 […]
With Alibaba Group Holding Ltd. filing to go public, the biggest winner won’t be founder Jack Ma or his fellow executives or even venture capital backers like Silver Lake Management LLC. It’ll be Japan’s Masayoshi Son. Fourteen years ago, Son’s SoftBank Corp. started with a $20 million bet on a then-unknown Web portal connecting Chinese manufacturers with overseas buyers. That site evolved into China’s biggest Internet shopping […]
|Richard Weizel | STORRS Conn. (Reuters) – University of Connecticut alumnus Rick Mastracchio took a break from orbiting the globe on the International Space Station to deliver an address to students graduating from the university’s School of Engineering on Saturday. With a large black UConn banner and UConn baseball cap floating behind him, Mastracchio hovered between two space suits and spun upside down several times during the pre-recorded […]
SolarReserve, a closely held U.S. power plant developer, is studying whether to bid for a 100 megawatt facility in Dubai and looking at projects in Jordan, Chief Executive Officer Kevin Smith said in an interview in Dubai. The company expects to hear by the end of the year whether it, GDF Suez (GSZ) unit International Power Ltd. and Abu Dhabi’s Masdar have won the right to build […]
Dubai-based hotel operator Jumeirah Group will invest 8 billion dirhams ($2.19 billion) to expand projects in 11 countries over the next three years, the official state news agency WAM reported on Friday. The group is part of Dubai Holding, a conglomerate owned by the emirate’s ruler, Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid al-Maktoum. The expansion will see an addition of 4,300 hotels rooms over the next three years, WAM […]
HSBC Holdings, the biggest manager of bond sales in the six-nation Gulf Cooperation Council, expects debt issues in the region to raise as much as $40 billion in 2014, almost matching last year’s total. Sales will start to catch up with 2013 volumes in the next two months, Mustafa Aziz Ata, head of Middle East and North Africa debt capital markets at the London-based bank, said in […]
Dubai will not have any issues in repaying all its debt maturing in 2015, and more state-linked firms are likely to repay obligations ahead of schedule, a top government official said on Tuesday. “We will have no issues in repaying debt coming up next year,” said Sheikh Ahmed bin Saeed al-Maktoum, a close advisor and uncle to Dubai’s ruler. Sheikh Ahmed, a key figure in the emirate’s […]
Low cost airline ‘flydubai’ will start its flights from Dubai to three Indian cities, including Delhi, from next month, doubling the number of its destinations in India. flydubai will start flights to Thiruvanthapuram, Kochi and Delhi from Dubai, taking the number of its services to six Indian cities, airline Chief Executive Officer Gaithal Gaith said here today. From June 1, the airline will start a four times […]
Having built a reputation on high-end luxury and opulence, Dubai is getting a makeover with some more affordable, one might even say cheaper, accommodation options. International hotel chains have wizened up to the need for mid-range hotels in a city that has built a reputation on excess. Chicago-based Hyatt Hotels Corp. on Monday brought its Hyatt Place brand to the Middle East, opening the hotel in older […]
Emirates, the No. 1 international airline, won’t be asked to move to Dubai’s new super-hub until 2024, avoiding disruption to its growth as it takes delivery of the world’s biggest fleet of wide-body jets. The sheikdom’s Al Maktoum airport, which opened in October and is targeting a capacity of 228 million passengers at a cost of 156.8 billion dirhams ($43 billion), should instead become an interim base […]
|By TAP Staff|A new Standard & Poor’s report has picked holes in UAE’s banking regulations and the legal infrastructure, citing these as risks for property and casualty insurance sectors. Financial system risk primarily arises from shortcomings in bank regulation, which the agency considers to be weak, although it acknowledges that the banking supervision is being improved. The report cites tighter mortgage regulation and limited credit exposure to […]
Emaar Economic City plans to raise 1 billion riyals ($267 million) to help finance construction of the King Abdullah Economic City and will spend 13 billion riyals developing the Saudi Arabian project over the next four years. The company, a unit of Dubai-based Emaar Properties, expects to arrange the loans from two or three banks before the end of 2016, Fahd Al Rasheed, chief executive officer of […]
French retail giant Carrefour SA has begun making plans to exit its India wholesale operations, the Times of India reported on Saturday. Carrefour operates five wholesale cash-and-carry outlets in India and, after foreign investment rules were eased in 2012, it had been widely expected to set up a chain of supermarkets. The company has seen senior-level exits from its India business recently and some employees may be […]
BEYOND – Memoirs In A Time Lapse from Beno Saradzic on Vimeo. If you haven’t made it to the United Arab Emirates yet, there’s no immediate need to fret. We’re about to save you a lot of time and money because watching this INCREDIBLE time lapse video will show you every aspect of the UAE in just a few short minutes. Shot over the course of two […]
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 […]
With its $2 billion purchase of Oculus Rift, Facebook has made its second bold acquisition of a rising technology star, little more than a month after its $19 billion mega deal with WhatsApp. This time it’s not the price tag surprising everyone, but the strategy. Does Mark Zuckerberg envision a future where strapping a headset to our faces becomes the default route to going on Facebook? It’s left many scratching their heads. Zuckerberg, […]
