http://www.zawya.com/story/DFM_achieves_100_compliance_in_quarterly_results_disclosure_of_UAE_companies-ZAWYA20120516114857/

http://www.zawya.com/story/UKUAE_Joint_Economic_Council_considers_7_joint_working_teams-WAM20120516161639531/

The investment was disclosed by Siemensin a regulatory filing.

Qatar had first indicated ownership of a smaller amount of the industrial group’s shares in March, with options to acquire a further stake.

Qatar, which is sitting on substantial wealth from its natural gas resources, has taken a string of equity stakes in Europe including in Royal Dutch Shell earlier this month.

Qatar Holding, an investment arm of the emirate’s sovereign wealth fund, already holds shares in a number of Germany’s best-known companies including a 17 per cent voting stake in carmaker Volkswagen.

Siemensis Germany’s largest company by market capitalisation and has no substantial “anchor” investor.

However, a stake of about 6 per cent in the industrial group is held by Siemensfamily members.

Most of the company is in the hands of international institutional investors. Siemensdeclined to comment on the Qatar investment.

The investment appears to highlight the appeal of German assets to investors from outside Europe, at a time when the eurozone’s largest economy is showing an ability to weather the continent’s financial crisis.

Many German companies also have investor appeal because of the growing share of their profits generated in emerging markets.

By James Wilson in Frankfurt

© Copyright The Financial Times Ltd 2012

http://www.zawya.com/story/Qatar_in_Europe_push_with_Siemens_stake-20120515_13001_9700/

The UAE banks account for 31 per cent of the total assets in the GCC, a report by QNB Group said. Saudi Arabia’s banking sector is in second place, with 28 per cent of GCC assets, but it is the smallest in relative terms, at around 71 per cent of GDP, the report said.

The report observed that the UAE has the highest level of domestic loan  penetration, 78 per cent of GDP, primarily as a result of extensive lending to the real estate sector. Saudi Arabia has the lowest, at 40 per cent of GDP, but this may increase when a long-awaited law reforming mortgage financing is implemented and boosts access to credit.

Analysis of the GCC banking sector performed by QNB Group concludes that the region’s banking sector’s prospects are stable and banks are expected to be remain profitable and that the sector itself has room for growth.

The report said that the GCC banking assets have been growing strongly in recent years, except for a slow period in 2009, at a compound annual growth rate of 7.5 per cent from 2007-11. This growth in banking assets is a consequence of the region’s economic boom, driven by high oil prices.

A recent report by the National Bank of Kuwait , NBK , endorses this view, forecasting that GCC banks would perform better this year because of high public spending and an increase in lending.

For banks in GCC countries, 2011 was a better year than the one before. Bank profits continued to improve and assets growth was healthy,  NBKsaid in its report.

“In the current global context, the region’s economic growth is relatively good, with governments at various stages of implementing ambitious capital spending plans to boost economic growth and funding is plentiful. However, some regional banks continued to deal with the after-effects of the 2008 global financial crisis, particularly on their asset quality,” it said.  According to QNB report, in terms of profitability, the combined net profit of the ten top GCC banks increased by 18.1 per cent in 2011, to $12.3 billion. QNB Group led the pack, with profit growth of 32 per cent to $2.1 billion.

The GCC’s banking sector is in a good position to support the ongoing development of the region. Strong GDP growth, which QNB Group forecasts will average 4.6 percent in real terms for the GCC in 2012-13, will increase the demand for bank financing across the economy. As a result, regional banking assets are expected to continue to grow strongly. At the same time, conservative banking policies will ensure that the banks remain stable through this period of growth.

The report said Qatar’s banking sector saw the most rapid increase in assets during 2011, growing by 22.3 per cent. It looks set to move ahead of Bahrain (an offshore financing hub) to take third place in the region by asset size, having previously overtaken Kuwait in 2010.

Domestic banks hold the majority of assets in each country, with the exception of Bahrain where foreign banks hold 57 per cent. For the region as a whole, domestic banks in their home countries hold 83 percent of assets.

Loans as a share of GDP in the GCC rose to 56 per cent in 2011, but this is low compared to countries like the UK where loans are 153 per cent of GDP.

This largely explains the GCC’s fairly low share of overall banking assets relative to GDP. There is therefore space for an increase in the loan penetration rates in the GCC, the report said.

http://www.zawya.com/story/UAE_accounts_for_31_of_GCC_banking_assets-ZAWYA20120516040329/

Everywhere you go in town the buzz is trying to be Corporate Governance
compliant. I say ‘trying’ as I’m not convinced everyone understands the real
benefits here.

Corporate governance is not just a set of rules for the big listed companies –
it is a framework of guidelines to make your business safer, more accountable,
transparent – and more attractive! Do you agree?

Attractive how? Well, are you seeking finance? Are you considering an exit
strategy? Are you trying to attract business from overseas and demonstrate that
we are indeed transparent, open and honest in this booming region?

In our own business we have experienced real value straight to the bottom line
by implementing and maintaining a corporate governance structure. A private
business with true independence on the board? Yes! A company with an ethics
policy? Yes! As a Dubai SME 100 ranked company, these efforts have been
applauded and recognised. Was this a result of being forced to adopt a code? No
– it is a result of being proactive.

It is odd then that some listed companies – whom now have a code to follow –
choose not to! Others, (i.e. banks) are exempt; come on! What can we do to
change this situation? Perhaps a bottom-up approach from the lifeblood of our
economy (yes, the SMEs), by voluntarily adhering to basic governance standards
would help. What say you?

After a steep fall in 2009 because of the 2008 global fiscal distress, the combined net foreign assets of the six-nation Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) climbed from around $1,149 billion at the end of 2010 to an all time high of nearly $1,605 billion at the end of 2011, an increase of $456 billion.

The estimates by the Washington-based Institute for International Finance (IIF) showed the assets would further swell by nearly $300 billion to $1905 billion at the end of 2012 and rise again to a new record of $2,139 billion at the end of 2013 as oil prices are projected to remain high.

Most GCC states recorded sharp increases in their net foreign assets in 2011 with those of the UAE growing by around $59 billion to $521 billion from about $462 billion at the end of 2010, the report showed.

It expected the country’s foreign assets, mostly held by the Abu Dhabi Investment Authority (ADIA), to continue rising in the next two years to reach around $579 billion at the end of 2012 and $630 billion at the end of 2013.

Saudi Arabia’s assets, controlled by the Saudi Arabian Monetary Agency (SAMA), central bank, soared by around $106 billion from $445 billion to nearly $551 billion in the same period.

Assets controlled by Kuwait’s investment authority and other institutions stood at $396 billion at the end of 2011 and were projected to leap to $457 billion at the end of 2012. Qatar’s net foreign assets were put at $59 billion and are expected to surge to nearly $107 billion in the same period.

The report estimated the assets of Oman and Bahrain at $16 billion and $18 billion, which could respectively rise to $19 billion and $20 billion.

The report gave no figures on increase in the other GCC members but said Qatar’s Investment Authority now controls a record $200 billion while Kuwait’s assets have exceeded that level.

IIF said the surge in the GCC’s net foreign assets was a result of a sharp rise in oil prices and production, which swelled by around 1.5 million bpd to 16.5 million bpd. Most of the increase was by Saudi Arabia, which boosted supplies to offset oil export disruption in conflict-battered Libya.

It said high prices and output boosted the GCC’s combined nominal GDP by nearly 31 per cent to a record high of around $1.4 trillion last year.

“Buoyant hydrocarbon revenue contributed to large fiscal and external surpluses despite strong import growth and fiscal expansion….the GCC’s consolidated external current account surplus is expected to increase to a new peak of $358 billion in 2012, compared with an estimated $327 billion in 2011,” said IIF, which groups major banks in Western countries.

“The diversified nature of investments, and the projected large current account surpluses, should result in a further increase in the stock of net foreign assets to about $2.1 trillion by end- 2013, equivalent to 140 per cent of projected GDP….about 60 per cent of the foreign assets of the region are managed by sovereign wealth funds (SWFs) and invested in diversified portfolios of public equities, fixed income securities, real estate, and minority shares in big-name global companies.”

After topping an estimated $685 billion in 2011, the region’s hydrocarbon export receipts look set to rise to near $730 billion in 2012.

Similarly, on the fiscal side, government revenue from hydrocarbons is now estimated at $536 billion for 2011, rising to $567 billion in 2012.

“The continued increase in hydrocarbon receipts comes from both firmer oil prices and further increases in production volumes.”

Dubai recorded a four percent rise between December 2011 and March 2012, the index showed, putting it ahead of the likes of Jakarta (3.3 percent) and London (2.7 percent).

Overall, the index showed its first quarterly fall since 2009 as prices fell 0.4 percent on average.

Knight Frank said Dubai’s house prices rose 2.7 percent since last September and 0.3 percent over the past 12 months.

Nairobi was the strongest performing prime global city over the past 12 months with an increase of 24.2 percent while Jakarta, Miami and London also posted double digit increases.

Overall, the index rose 1.4 percent in the 12 months to March 2012.

Globally, the first three months of 2012 brought with it little new momentum. The Eurozone’s debt debacle remained at the forefront of the global economic agenda, several critical elections were on the horizon (Russia, France, Greece) and Asia’s highly-effective cooling measures showed no sign of being relaxed.

Against this backdrop some luxury buyers took to the side-lines to observe their market’s trajectory, Knight Frank said.

Nicholas Holt, Knight Frank’s Asia-Pacific research director, said the overall index is likely to remain subdued in 2012 fluctuating between marginal price falls and rises.

“It seems unlikely we are on the cusp of a new deflationary cycle in luxury global house prices,” he said.

Last month, Jones Lang LaSalle said residential property prices in Dubai had bottomed out, reaching prices not seen since early 2008.

Villa sales increased three percent in the first quarter of 2012, compared to a peak in the third quarter of 2008, but prices still remain 25 percent lower, the firm said in its quarterly Dubai real estate market overview.

Apartment sales in the emirate also started to stablise in the first three months of the year, but prices remain low, down 34 percent compared to 3Q 2008, JLL said.

Property prices in Dubai soared after the city opened its real estate sector to foreign investors in 2002, granting them freehold ownership rights at many developments.

From start-2007 to mid-2008, prices rallied almost 80 percent, Morgan Stanley estimates showed, with billions of dollars worth of new projects launched by local developers.

But home prices in Dubai suffered the biggest reversal seen in the Gulf property market as result of the financial crisis, declining on average 60 percent.

Around 3,000 units were added to the emirate’s residential stock inventory in the first three months of 2012, while around 43,000 additional units are expected to be delivered by the end of 2014.
http://www.arabianbusiness.com/dubai-outperforms-global-property-markets-in-q1-457808.html