SMEs to benefit from QR3bn procurement opportunities: QDB

Wednesday, March 9, 2016Jumada I 29, 1437 AH

BUSINESSGULF TIMES

Fed offi cials set battle lines on rate hikes

Economy shrinks 1.1%, mood sours

MARCH MEET | Page 19JAPAN Q4 | Page 16

SMEs to benefi t from QR3bn procurement opportunities: QDB By Peter AlagosBusiness Reporter

Over 450 procurement opportunities worth more than QR3bn from government and semi-government agencies will be made

available to small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) in Qatar within the year, a Qatar Develop-ment Bank (QDB) offi cial has said.

Abdulaziz bin Nasser al-Khalifa, chief executive offi cer of QDB, made the statement on the sidelines of the opening ceremony of the “1st Government Procurement and Contracting Conference & Exhi-bition (Moushtarayat)” held yesterday at the Qatar National Convention Centre (QNCC).

This was underscored in a speech by HE the Gov-ernor of the Qatar Central Bank Sheikh Abdullah bin Saud al-Thani, who lauded QDB saying the bank has launched a “single window” that provides SMEs “all the procedures and requirements under one roof.”

“This service achieved a great success and con-tributed to placing the bank in the top 10 of develop-ment banks in the world according to the classifi ca-tion of the World Trade Organisation 2015,” he said.

Sheikh Abdullah, who is also QDB chairman, pointed out that the bank has developed, diversifi ed, and upgraded its products and services, includ-ing direct fi nancing, which exceeded QR4.3bn, “Al Dhameen” programme (more than QR800mn), and “Tasdeer” programme (more than QR600mn).

“All these services have facilitated the access of small and medium enterprises to the funds they need,” he said.

Al-Khalifa explained that “Moushtarayat” aims to open new opportunities for interaction between lo-cal SMEs and stakeholders, in addition to strength-ening co-operation between the private and public sector companies in Qatar.

“This event creates a platform for matchmak-ing between SMEs and government and semi-gov-ernment procurement requirements. Through this platform, QDB can explain the requirements and needs of these agencies, and match them with SMEs that can supply that particular demand.

“QDB will also provide SMEs assistance in terms fi nancial, technical, and advisory support to ensure that these companies are able to meet that demand,” al-Khalifa told Gulf Times.

The QDB offi cial also stressed that SMEs and oth-er entrepreneurs must be registered with the Min-istry of Finance’s e-Procurement platform, a con-solidated website where bidders can apply tenders online. The website contains all government tenders from more than 120 government entities.

Al-Khalifa stressed that Law No 24 of 2015 (a law regulating tenders and auctions), issued in De-cember by HH the Emir Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad al-Thani, allows QDB to exempt SMEs from prereq-uisites like advanced payment guarantees and bid bonds or performance bonds.

In his opening speech, HE the Prime Minister and Minister of Interior Sheikh Abdullah bin Nasser bin Khalifa al-Thani said Law No 24 of 2015 “is a clear sign of supporting small and medium enterprises sector in Qatar.”

“HH the Emir Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad al-Thani has shown landmarks of the contribution and the role of the private sector to overcome challenges and move forward towards achieving the Qatar National Vision 2030, and a comprehensive and sustainable development at various levels.

“The most important requirements of this stage are providing ideas and creative solutions and not to compete with the private sector, but to strengthen its role and increase its contribution to the develop-ment wheel,” the Prime Minister said. Page 20

UDC to implement several projects under its business plan for 2016United Development Com-

pany (UDC) will begin to implement several projects

as part of its business plan this year, which include two key residential towers, company chairman Turki Mohammed al-Khater has said.

Addressing UDC shareholders at their annual ordinary general as-sembly meeting at Marsa Malaz Kempinski Hotel, at The Pearl-Qatar he said the projects included the development of two residential towers at ‘Viva Bahriya’ and de-velopment of the ‘Giardino Villas’ area. Besides, UDC will “contribute to the development” of The Pearl Sea Resort and upgrading and the Pearl-Qatar infrastructure in line with the current and future re-quirements.

Al-Khater said, “UDC net profi t increased by 8% to QR732.8mn compared to 2014, while the net profi t attributable to owners of the company stood at QR689.6mn, with an increase of 10% compared to 2014.

“By implementing our commit-ment to growth strategy and focus on core business, we have succeeded in 2015, in pursuing opportunities which drive business development in diverse and vital industries.”

Al-Khater said, “The fi nan-

cial results for year 2015 refl ect the positive performance and progress, leading the company to propose div-idend distribution of QR1.50 a share, which is more than the last year by 20%. 2015 was a year of achievement for UDC and we are looking forward for the same in 2016”.

UDC president and chief execu-tive offi cer Ibrahim Jassim al-Oth-man said the growth in the com-pany’s net profi t was “coupled with the positive increase” in earnings per share.

The earnings per share for 2015 increased by 10% than the previous year reaching QR1.95 a share.

He also added that 2015 witnessed the issuance of the company’s amended Organisation Structure leading to optimising cost that are necessary to carry out the its com-mercial operations.

Al-Othman stated that 2016 would witness the execution of the company’s strategy, whose main objectives were to concentrate on the core commercial activities and maintain appropriate level of recur-ring revenues in a way to meet the shareholders expectations.

The annual ordinary general as-sembly meeting chaired by al-Khat-er was attended by the company’s board of directors among others.

INNOVATIVE TECH: Page 20

Qatar Airways to unveil new stand concept at ITB Berlin

Qatar real growth to average 3.6% until 2019, says Moody’s By Santhosh V PerumalBusiness Reporter

Qatar’s real growth is expected to

average 3.6% until 2019, markedly lower

than the 2011-15 average; even as its

fixed-exchange rate regime remains

credible, supported by large foreign

currency reserves, according to global

credit rating agency Moody’s.

Expecting that the government’s

focus on infrastructure projects will

support real gross domestic product

(GDP) growth over the next four years;

Moody’s however projects that Qatar’s

overall real GDP growth until 2019 will

be markedly lower than the average

growth of more than 6% between 2011

and 2015.

Further to the adoption of a countercy-

clical spending approach in 2015, Qatari

government has stated its intention to

undertake a range of plans to mitigate

the impact on its credit standing,

including cuts to expenditure, and

revenue-enhancing measures, but no

clear timeline has been announced yet,

it said.

Moody’s is currently reviewing its

credit rating on Qatar to assess the

credibility and sustainability of those

plans and the government’s ability to

mitigate the impact of low oil prices on

its credit standing. The rating agency is

also evaluating the outlook for Qatar’s

medium-term economic diversifica-

tion plans and how these will aff ect its

assessment of the country’s economic

strength, which is currently scored as

‘very high’.

During the review, Moody’s will assess

the extent of the impact of the further

sharp fall in oil prices, which it expects

to remain low for several years, on

Qatar’s economic performance and the

balance sheet of its government in the

coming years.

Qatar is highly dependent on hydrocar-

bons to drive economic growth and to

finance government expenditure. Oil

and gas accounted for 75% of goods ex-

ports and more than 50% of GDP during

2010-14. It provided more than 80% to

the exchequer during the same period.

Between September 2014 and

September 2015, oil prices roughly

halved. Since then, it has fallen a

further 40%. Moody’s recently revised

its oil price assumptions for Brent to

$33 per barrel in 2016 and $38 in 2017,

rising only slowly thereafter to $48

by 2019.

“The structural shock to the oil market

is aff ecting Qatar’s government balance

sheet, and its economy, and therefore

also its credit profile,” it said.

Between 2013 and 2015, the fiscal sur-

plus fell from about 14% of GDP in 2013

to less than 3% last year, Moody’s said,

adding Qatar current account surplus

relative to GDP narrowed from almost

30% to around 8%.

The government’s focus on continued

capital spending on infrastructure

projects in the run-up to the 2022

FIFA World Cup, in combination with

depressed oil prices over the coming

years, would imply that Qatar’s fiscal

balance will turn into a deficit of more

than 6% of GDP on average until 2018,

and a rise of 10 percentage points in

Qatar’s debt burden over 2016-18 com-

pared to Moody’s estimate of general

government debt of around 33% of GDP

in 2015.

Expecting that the government retains

very significant financial buff ers despite

the negative eff ects of lower oil price,

Moody’s estimates that assets managed

by the Qatar Investment Authority have

risen from $243.5bn or 120.6% of GDP

in 2013 to $329bn or 183.4% of GDP in

2015.

This is 5.5 times Moody’s estimate of to-

tal government debt for 2015, although

potential calls on these funds are grow-

ing in a low oil price environment - ema-

nating from the possible future need to

refinance government debt, support the

banking industry, refinance the debt of

state owned entities, and fund future

budget deficits.

Qatar’s currency is pegged to the US

dollar and, in Moody’s view, the fixed-

exchange rate regime remains credible

and is supported by the country’s large

foreign currency reserves, which were

$36.4bn in December 2015, $7bn lower

than in July 2015.

‘Qatar hospitality industry set to see $7bn investmentQatar, which is at the forefront of a regional tourism

investment drive, is expected to see investments of

more than $7bn in the hospitality industry, according to

Meed Projects, a regional online projects tacking service

provider.

It includes new properties run by brands such as JW

Marriott, Hilton, Waldorf Astoria, Langham, Ibis, Mandarin

Oriental, Holiday Inn and Centara. In total, several rooms in

the construction pipeline is over 10,000, it said, ahead of

Qatar Projects Conference taking place next week.

As part of its commitment to hosting the 2022 FIFA World

Cup, Qatar is aiming to build an additional 40,000 rooms

for the hundreds of thousands of fans expected to watch

matches in the state.

These rooms would be contained within 240 diff erent ho-

tels ranging between two and five stars, including a cruise

ship at Al Wakrah with 6,000 rooms. These new rooms

would substantially add to the existing 44,000 rooms

Qatar had when it bid for the rights to host the World Cup

in 2010.

“Hotel building and tourism development in general in Qa-

tar is going through unprecedented growth, as developers

and operators prepare for the World Cup and the state’s

National Tourism Sector Strategy 2030,” Ed James, direc-

tor of content and analysis at MEED Projects, said.

The pressure of the event’s hard stop deadline has

resulted in a frenzy of building activity as investors seek to

capitalise on the thousands of visitors expected to attend

the competition to support their teams, he added.

Qatar’s 2030 tourism strategy, under the aegis of the

Qatar Tourism Authority, is aimed at building on the World

Cup investment to attract more than 7mn tourists a year to

the state by 2030, up from 1.2mn in 2012. At the same time,

tourism spend is set to increase from $1.4bn to $11bn by

2030 when the sector is expected to account for about 5%

of Qatar’s gross domestic product.

Al-Khater (left) and al-Othman: Commitment to growth strategy.

HE the Prime Minister and Minister of Interior Sheikh Abdullah bin Nasser bin Khalifa al-Thani, along with other ministers, the QCB governor and dignitaries, tours the exhibition hall of the “1st Government Procurement and Contracting Conference & Exhibition” held at the QNCC. PICTURE: Najeer Feroke

UDC’s new board of directors

The following have been elected to the UDC board of directors for 2016-18: Abdullah Ali al-Abdullah; Turki Mohammed Khalid al-Khater; Dr Thani Abdul Rahman Shahin al-Sheikh al-Kuwari; Abdul Rahman Abdullah Abdul Ghani Nasser

al-Ghani; Ali Hussein Ibrahim al-Fardan; Nawaf Ibrahim Hamad al-Manna; Abdul Aziz Mohammed Hamad Abdullah al-Mana; Colonel Nasser Hamad Ali al-Yousef al-Sulaiti and Abdul Rahman Saad Zaid Alsitri.

4 ISLAMIC FINANCE GULF TIMESWednesday, March 9, 2016

Negative interest rates pose the biggest threat to Islamic fi nance By Arno MaierbruggerGulf Times Correspondent Bangkok

Switzerland did it; Sweden, Denmark and, as of recently, the European Central Bank and Japan, at least for

larger reserves: They pushed interbank interest rates below zero, and many banks in those countries started to pass on the costs to large depositors, while the large mass of retail clients might come next to be hit by below-zero returns on their sav-ings.

Commentators called it “bizarre” that the process of saving money at a bank now leads to a reduction of the principal as money in the form of negative interest has to be paid for the “privilege” of maintain-ing a deposit. But it has become a fi nancial fact as central banks of major economies keep battling persistent systemic weak-ness and low infl ation and try hard to spur credit growth.

The serious issue that the entire fi nan-cial world, including Islamic fi nance, is facing is that never before in history in-terest rates below zero have been used in so many economies at the same time, and more countries are likely to follow – Nor-way, Canada, the UK - and even US Fed-eral Reserve chairwoman Janet Yellen said that she was “open to the possibility” of introducing negative rates although she just had started raising them.

And after that happens, the era of zero or negative interest rates could extend for several more years Barclay bank said in a study released on March 3.

“Negative nominal interest rates are more than just a passing monetary fad,” said Michael Gapen, one of the bank’s top economists, adding that he believes “the era of low or even negative interest rates across the developed world could last for several years to come.”

But when negative interest rates in the UK and the US become a reality and indeed last for several years, then the Islamic fi -nance sector will have to deal with a fun-damental problem even though it doesn’t even use an interest scheme in its system. The UK’s Islamic fi nance sector, which just emancipated itself from a niche to a sizeable segment of the fi nancial industry and to a Western hub for Islamic fi nance, would feel the heat immediately, and Gulf Cooperation Council nations, all of whose

currencies but one are pegged to the US dollar and which have large Islamic fi nance industries, would be forced to absorb the negative interest eff ect in their macro economies and their banking system.

For Islamic fi nance, dealing with the fallout of negative interest rates from the conventional fi nance system on such a large scale is a fi rst. It is subsumed in the Shariah fi nance theory as “unconven-tional risk,” disequilibrating the basically balanced risk-sharing principle of Islamic fi nance which, as we know, does not use interest neither for loans nor for deposits, but – in simplifi ed terms – sets profi t rates for borrowed money on the back of an as-set it buys and leases to a client.

But because Islamic banking stands in open competition to conventional bank-ing and thus always brings its profi t rates in line with conventional interest rates for both deposits and loans – which is im-perative to avoid arbitraging and a subse-quent collapse of the fi nancial system – it will have to rebuild the zero-to-negative interest environment.

But this is extremely diffi cult because Islamic banks in such a scenario would not earn profi t rates on borrowings any long-er, and at the same would have to charge “negative profi t rates” (i.e. additional fees) for deposits which would of course incen-tivise depositors to withdraw their money. It would cause a liquidity crisis for the bank itself in the process, in addition to a run of clients seeking to refi nance their Islamic loans and restructure their debts which they only can do by setting up sale and buy-back agreement at a cost.

Here it strikes back that most Islamic fi nance institutions did not catch up by developing suffi ciently dimensioned hedging products or derivatives which could fend off these problems to a certain extent. Thus there is nothing much left for Islamic banks in the lending business than to use their profi ts from good years to cover losses from the current bad years – in the worst case stressing their bal-ance sheets to the utmost in case Barclays’ prophecy comes true.

EDUCATION/General FAQ

Is the prohibition of interest the same in whether one deposits in a bank located in a Muslim or a non-Muslim country?The ruling in regard to depositors

taking interest is the same whether

the bank is located in a Muslim or in

a non-Muslim country. The interest

earned on the deposits is unlawful

for the Muslim to consume or use to

his personal benefit.

May I trade like items sold by measurement?It is permissible to transact any like

goods sold by measurement or

counting (e.g. one type of orange

for another). It is not obligatory that

they be equal weight, but they must

be equal in measure or count, and

the transaction must be conducted

on spot.

Is it obligatory to support one’s parents even when they are not needy?It is not obligatory to provide one’s

parent with financial support when

they are not needy, though it is still

recommended to give if they ask.

What does the Shariah say regarding the obligation of sup-porting one’s children?Both men and women are equally

obligated to support their children

until the child reaches adulthood,

including those of their Muslim or

non-Muslim children (grandchildren,

great grandchildren, and their direct

descendants) stricken by poverty

(obligatory only when there is pov-

erty), even if these children grow

to adulthood while they are still

impoverished. The obligation of sup-

port rests on parents who have the

means to do so once they have paid

the typical maintenance for them-

selves (and one’s wife, if a husband)

necessary for one day before spend-

ing it on one’s children. In order to

satisfy the obligation to support

one’s child, which includes repaying

any debts the child incurs in order

to cover the child’s living expenses,

one is even obligated to sell one’s

own property in excess of one’s

needs. The right of the younger child

comes before the right of the older

one (respectively for grandchildren,

great grandchildren, and their direct

descendants.)

Is it permissible to accept an investment that may have been stolen?It is not permissible to give or take

investment when one is certain the

investment itself is stolen; if there

is doubt then it is permissible to

give or take the investment, though

it is always superior to avoid the

doubtful.

What is gharar?Gharar refers to uncertainty or

ambiguity that may lead to dispute

between contracting parties. For in-

stance, executing a contract before

the price, subject matter, or transact-

ing parties are definitively known.

Source: Ethica Institute of Islamic

Finance via Bloomberg

Malaysia’s biggest bank says Islamic loans overtake conventional BloombergKuala Lumpur

Malayan Banking Bhd provided more

Islamic loans than non-Shariah compliant

financing in Malaysia for the first time

in 2015 and the business was also more

profitable.

Maybank Islamic Bhd contributed 51% of

financings by the nation’s biggest lender,

up from 44% in 2014, and a share 10 to 20

percentage points higher is possible, chief

executive off icer Muzaff ar Hisham, said

in an interview in Kuala Lumpur. The unit

achieved an average 16% return on equity

in the last four years, compared with 14%

for its parent.

“There’s no doubt it will be challenging

but what we have done over the last cou-

ple of years surpassed the expectations

of the industry,” said Muzaff ar. Maybank

Islamic attracted more customers due to

competitive rates and its contributions to

zakat, or charity, have also helped it lure

business, he said.

The lender’s success bodes well for the

government’s goal of having 40% of

banking comply with the tenets of the

Qur’an by 2020, up from 26% at the end

of August. Malaysia, where more than

60% of the population is Muslim, pio-

neered Islamic finance in the 1980s and

is the world’s biggest issuer of Shariah-

compliant bonds.

“Maybank’s achievement augurs well for

the Islamic finance industry and there’s

still growth potential,” said Nik Norzrul

Thani, chairman of Kuala Lumpur-based

law firm Zaid Ibrahim & Co. “It will also

spur other lenders, both locally and inter-

nationally, to match its returns.”

Maybank Islamic’s total financing rose

21% to 131.1bn ringgit ($31.7bn) last

year. Growth will probably moderate

to less than 10% in 2016 due to slowing

economic growth and global headwinds,

Muzaff ar said. Malaysia’s economy, which

has been hurt by falling commodity

prices, will expand 4.4% this year, from

5% in 2015, according to a Bloomberg

survey.

Shariah law forbids the payment of inter-

est and Islamic loans are structured using

discounts, sale or lease, profit participa-

tion or repurchase agreements.

The bank sold 1bn ringgit of Basel III-

compliant sukuk maturing in 2026 last

month at a coupon rate of 4.65% and the

debt yielded 4.95% on Thursday, accord-

ing to prices compiled by Bloomberg. The

lender may tap the local Islamic bond

market again this year if a “window of op-

portunity arises,” Muzaff ar said.

Maybank Islamic is the world’s third-big-

gest Shariah lender outside of Iran after

Saudi Arabia’s Al Rajhi Bank and Kuwait

Finance House. The Kuala Lumpur-

based bank’s profit before tax grew at an

average of 18.6% in the past five years to

1.64bn ringgit in 2015. It’s the domestic

market leader for loans and deposits with

respective market shares of 33.5% and

26.3%.

A global Islamic population that’s expand-

ing faster than non-Muslims and becom-

ing more wealthy is driving growth in

Shariah-compliant finance. The industry’s

worldwide assets will double to $3.4tn by

2018 from 2013, according to an estimate

by Ernst & Young.

“Islamic banking itself is already a bit of

a blue ocean that we can tap,” Muzaff ar

said.

Cash-hungry Petronas gets boost as Malaysia sukuk costs decline BloombergKuala Lumpur

Malaysia’s state oil company is enjoying a twin boost as com-modity prices rally and Islamic

bond costs fall just as it considers bor-rowing.

The diff erence in yield between 10-year government sukuk and two-year securities shrank to a fi ve-month low of 91 basis points last week from as high as 128 in early January, making longer-term fi nancing attractive for is-suers such as Petroliam Nasional Bhd. That’s been helped by record foreign purchases of ringgit government bonds last month, a rally in the currency and a recovery in Brent crude.

Petronas last month posted its third loss in fi ve quarters, announced plans to cut 1,000 jobs and said it may need to raise funds and tap cash reserves to cov-er capital expenditure and dividends. The decline in bond costs is also a bright spot for Prime Minister Najib Razak, who’s seeking to fi nance a $444bn de-velopment plan while contending with slowing growth.

“The fl attening yield curve refl ects the general perception that the pace of domestic economic growth won’t be strong,” said James Lau, a Kuala Lumpur-based investment director at

Pheim Asset Management Asia Bhd. overseeing $300mn. “The sweet spot remains for companies, especially those involved in development projects, to tap the loan and debt markets.” Azman Ib-rahim, a Petronas offi cial, couldn’t im-mediately be reached for comment by phone or e-mail late on Monday.

Corporate sales of bonds that pro-hibit the payment of interest more than

doubled in Malaysia to 9.6bn ringgit ($2.3bn) in 2016 from a year earlier, ac-cording to data compiled by Bloomberg. The ringgit rallied 4.7%, the best per-formance among 24 emerging-market currencies after Indonesia’s rupiah and the Brazilian real.

Overseas investors increased hold-ings of Malaysian sovereign ringgit bonds to an unprecedented 176.7bn

ringgit in February from the previous month as a global sell-off in equities at the start of the year boosted demand for fi xed- income securities. When ac-counting for company notes, total own-ership fell 0.6% to 215bn ringgit.

“Demand-supply dynamics for Is-lamic bonds will stay favorable from the shift in asset allocation given the weak-ness seen in equities and other asset classes,” said Fakrizzaki Ghazali, a Kuala Lumpur-based strategist at RHB Re-search Institute Sdn. “Nonetheless, this may not be a one-way aff air as markets could be highly volatile again.”

The 10-year Shariah-compliant yield fell 41 basis points in 2016 to a seven-month low of 4.11%, almost six times as fast as the decline on the equivalent two-year debt, according to Bank Ne-gara Malaysia indexes.

The possibility the central bank may ease monetary policy this year may also further support demand for bonds. Bank Negara unexpectedly cut the stat-utory reserve requirement for lenders at its last meeting in January and kept the benchmark interest rate at 3.25%. It’s also forecast by all 19 economists in a Bloomberg survey to hold the rate today.

Bank Negara expects infl ation to tick higher to 2.5% to 3.5% this year from 2.1% in 2015 even as economists bet growth will weaken to 4.4%, the slow-est since a contraction in 2009.

Hong Kong closes in on Indonesia in dollar sukukBloombergKuala Lumpur

Hong Kong’s possible third Islamic global bond in three years brings it

closer to Indonesia and Malay-sia in terms of sovereign sukuk presence, a boost to the market that coincides with China’s Silk Road revival.

The fi nance centre has al-ready raised $2bn from sales in 2014 and 2015, which attracted $6.7bn in total orders, while In-donesia plans to tap investors for the sixth year running and Ma-laysia is returning for its seventh off ering. While the city only has 270,000 people following the teachings of the Qur’an, it’s positioning itself as a vital port and fi nancing hub for China’s ‘One Belt One Road’ policy an-nounced by President Xi Jinping in 2013.

“The announcement is a great sign of Hong Kong’s continued wish to be at the centre of peo-ple’s minds when it comes to Islamic fi nancing in Asia, par-ticularly as momentum builds around China’s belt and road initiative,” said Davide Barzilai, Hong Kong-based head of Is-lamic Finance for Asia Pacifi c at law fi rm Norton Rose Fulbright. “We will fi nd that Islamic-com-pliant investors will see the at-tractions.”

Hong Kong, which is losing its role as a gateway to China as Shanghai’s fi nancial market opens, is keen to become the launch pad for the global am-bitions of Chinese companies, including building roads, rail-ways and ports along the tradi-tional Silk Road to the Middle East, Africa and Europe. While the ex-British colony is making progress after putting in legis-lation for Shariah-compliant bonds in 2013, Singapore’s aspi-rations are stalling.

Gulf TimesExclusive

A Petronas gas station stands in front of the Petronas Twin Towers in Kuala Lumpur. Petronas last month posted its third loss in five quarters, announced plans to cut 1,000 jobs and said it may need to raise funds and tap cash reserves to cover capital expenditure and dividends.

BUSINESS5Gulf Times

Wednesday, March 9, 2016

Insurance, realty, consumer goods help QSE cross 10,400 By Santhosh V PerumalBusiness Reporter

The Qatar Stock Exchange yesterday crossed the 10,400 resistance level mainly on buying support from local

and non-Qatari retail investors.Insurance, real estate and consumer

goods lifted the 20-stock Qatar Index 0.48%, or 50 points, to 10,418.23 points, re-fl ecting the strong rebound in the oil prices, which breached the $40 a barrel.

Weak selling by Gulf individual inves-tors also helped the bourse, which is down 0.11% year-to-date.

However, domestic institutions turned bearish and there was increased net selling by Gulf institutions in the market, where trading turnover and volumes were on the decline.

The index that tracks Shariah-principled stocks was seen gaining slower than the other indices in the market, where bank-ing, industrials, consumer goods and realty stocks together accounted for about 86% of the total trading volume.

Market capitalisation was up 0.09%, or QR47mn, to QR547.64bn with large and mi-cro cap equities gaining 0.28% and 0.07%; while mid and small caps shrank 0.86% and 0.16% respectively.

The Total Return Index gained 0.68% to 16,544.67 points, the All Share Index by 0.53% to 2,814.91 points and the Al Rayan Islamic Index by 0.42% to 3,890.56 points.

Insurance stocks appreciated 3.79%, followed by real estate (1.06%), consumer goods (0.87%), banks and fi nancial serv-ices (0.4%) and telecom (0.39%); whereas industrials and transport fell 0.41% and 0.16% respectively.

About 53% of the stocks extended gains with major movers being Qatar Insurance, Ezdan, Qatar Islamic Bank, Masraf Al Ray-an, Islamic Holding Group and Ooredoo; even as QNB, Doha Bank, Woqod, Qatar National Cement, Aamal Company, Barwa and Dlala bucked the trend.

Local retail investors turned net buyers to

the tune of QR26.31mn compared with sell-ers of QR29.44mn the previous day.

Non-Qatari individual investors were also net buyers to the extent of QR12.54mn against net sellers of QR18.08mn on March 7.

The GCC (Gulf Cooperation Coun-cil) individuals’ net selling weakened to QR0.18mn compared to QR4.96mn on Monday.

However, domestic institutions turned net sellers to the tune of QR47.6mn against net buyers of QR4.69mn the previous day.

Non-Qatari institutions’ net buying plummeted to QR34.1mn compared to QR56.34mn on March 7.

The GCC institutions’ net profi t-

booking increased to QR25.08mn against QR8.55mn on Monday.

Total trade volume fell 48% to 12.13mn shares, value by 30% to QR455.93mn and deals by 32% to 6,219.

There was a 74% plunge in the real estate sector’s trade volume to 1.52mn equities, 65% in value to QR41.86mn and 69% in transactions to 565.

The telecom sector’s trade volume plum-meted 66% to 1.13mn stocks, value by 60% to QR23.05mn and deals by 55% to 620.

The insurance sector reported a 56% shrinkage in trade volume to 0.08mn shares, 58% in value to QR5.17mn and 45% in transactions to 108.

The consumer goods sector’s trade vol-

ume tanked 47% to 1.8mn equities but val-ue gained 21% to QR55.02mn and deals by 29% to 919.

The transport sector saw a 43% decline in trade volume to 0.5mn stocks, 29% in value to QR15.68mn and 31% in transac-tions to 180.

The industrials sector’s trade volume shrank 31% to 3.28mn shares, value by 31% to QR141.7mn and deals by 28% to 1,557.

The banks and fi nancial services sec-tor witnessed a 24% fall in trade vol-ume to 3.81mn equities, 9% in value to QR173.44mn and 14% in transactions to 2,270.

In the debt market, there was no trading of treasury bills and government bonds.

‘EFG-Hermes mulls expansion in new frontier markets’

BloombergDubai

EFG-Hermes is considering opportuni-

ties to expand into new frontier markets

and aims to build a “leading non-bank

finance house” in Egypt, at a time when

billionaire Naguib Sawiris is aiming

to challenge the investment bank’s

dominance in the most populous Arab

country.

The biggest publicly traded Arab

investment bank is looking for ways to

diversify sources of revenue through

expansion into markets that include

Africa, chief executive off icer Karim

Awad said in an interview in Dubai.

The Cairo-based company has a “very

healthy” pipeline of possible initial

public off erings to manage in Egypt and

the UAE, he said.

Awad’s remarks come as Sawiris, an

Egyptian who made his fortune in the

telecommunication industry, expands

into financial services with the purchase

of Egypt’s Beltone Financial and CI Capi-

tal. The combined entity will be Egypt’s

second-largest investment bank, the

billionaire said in an interview in Cairo

on Sunday.

Sawiris “participation in the financial

sector is a good sign of the prospects

this industry would have in the medium-

to-long term,” Awad said. The bank’s

current strategy will help it maintain

market share and remain the largest in

the region, he said. EFG-Hermes has of-

fices in 7 Arab countries including Saudi

Arabia, Oman, Kuwait, Jordan, accord-

ing to its website. In Lebanon, it owns a

63.7% majority stake in the commercial

bank Crédit Libanais.

Awad said that EFG’s investment in

Crédit Libanais was a “dollar hedge”

amid Egypt’s foreign-currency shortage,

in response to a question about Leba-

nese media reports that a number of

investors were interested in the stake.

“There is absolutely no pressure to do

something, but again if we get the right

value for it we will do something,” Awad

said, declining to confirm of deny inves-

tor interest.

Gulf stocks rise with oil price above $40ReutersDubai

Most stock markets in the Gulf rose yesterday after oil prices

firmed above $40 a barrel, while Egypt climbed as foreign inves-

tors accumulated shares.

While many regional fund managers believe Gulf stock markets

could still be pressured this year by further squeezes in corpo-

rate earnings, as governments continue to tighten fiscal policy,

for now investors are focusing on the idea that the worst is over

for oil prices.

Riyadh’s stock index added 0.7% in heavy trade. Petrochemical

heavyweight Saudi Basic Industries advanced 1.0% and other

oil-linked stocks also gained.

Food and agriculture shares were strong, with the largest dairy

producer, Almarai, and National Agriculture Development rising

1.7 and 7.9% respectively.

“While Saudi Arabia’s growth is expected to face a slowdown in

2016, we believe that the food and drink sector will benefit from

structural factors, including favourable demographics, higher

employment of locals in the private sector and increasing levels

of urbanisation,” said a note by Riyadh-based Aljazira Capital.

Dubai’s index ended up 0.2% in volatile trade as speculators

booked profits in some mid- and small-cap shares and chased

after others.

Arabtec, which was up as much as 2.9% in early trade, ended flat.

The builder fell 6.6% on Monday after the company said in a brief

statement that rumours former chief executive Hasan Ismaik

would be appointed to its board were false. Fellow construction

firm Drake & Scul l fell 0.8%. Union Properties closed up 0.8% at

0.92 dirham, off a session high of 0.97 dirham. Deyaar Develop-

ment ended flat after trading up.

Abu Dhabi’s benchmark added 0.4% in its eighth straight session

of gains, with volumes concentrated in mid-sized companies

favoured by local traders.

Islamic insurer Methaq Takaful Insurance soared 14.3%, it daily

limit, in unusually heavy trade and while Union National Bank

jumped 11.7%.

Egypt’s index rose 1.3% in its fourth straight day of gains as for-

eign investors were net buyers, bourse data showed, after being

largely absent from the market in previous days.

The Egyptian pound strengthened on the black market on Tues-

day, two days after the central bank injected $500mn into the

banking system in an exceptional auction. Recently the currency

has been depreciating rapidly on the black market.

Global Telecom and Commercial International Bank, shares

favoured by international portfolio managers, were each up by

more than 1.5% yesterday.

But Orascom Telecom, the most heavily traded stock by far, fell

1.6% after rising by the same percentage in early trade.

On Sunday OTMT said it would lend its subsidiary Beltone Finan-

cial 1bn Egyptian pounds ($128mn) to acquire the investment

arm of Cairo’s largest lender Commercial International Bank, CI

Capital.

Elsewhere in the Gulf, Kuwait’s index added 0.4% to 5,285 points;

Oman’s index fell 0.6% to 5,363 points, while Bahrain’s index fell

0.8% to 1,163 points.

Insurance, real estate and consumer goods stocks yesterday lifted the 20-stock Qatar Index 0.48%, or 50 points, to close at 10,418.23 points. PICTURE: Noushad Thekkayil.

Mideast carriers top demand growth in passenger traffi c: IATA Middle East carriers had the strongest year-on-

year demand growth in passenger traffi c in Janu-ary at 10.9%, helped by ongoing network and fl eet

expansion, the International Air Transport Association (IATA) has said in a report.

Capacity rose 12.9% and load factor dipped 1.4 percent-age points to 77.8%, it said.

In the Middle East, the demand growth is spurred by the rapid fl eet and network expansion by Qatar Airways, Emir-ates and Etihad, which are dubbed ‘Gulf 3’.

IATA’s global passenger traffi c results for January 2016 showed demand (revenue passenger kilometres, or RPKs) rose 7.1% compared to January 2015. This was ahead of the 2015 full year growth rate of 6.5%. January capacity rose 5.6%, with the result that load factor rose 1.1 percentage points to 78.8%, the highest load factor ever recorded for the fi rst month of the year.

According to IATA, airlines have continued to react to robust travel demand by adding capacity cautiously (total available seat kilometres increased by 5.6% year-on-year in January).

As a result, at 78.8% in January, the industry load factor was the highest ever recorded in the month, 1.1 percentage point higher than in the same period in 2015.

In fact, passenger loads reached an all-time January-high in four of the six regions, and were just 0.1 percent-age points below their record high in North America too. As was the case in 2015, the Middle East remains the nota-ble exception, with capacity growth continuing to outstrip even double-digit annual growth in passenger traffi c.

Underlying conditions continue to point to another strong year of growth for passenger traffi c. While the glo-bal economy continues to face downside risks, another year of modest economic growth will not present a ma-jor headwind. Moreover, although the downward trend in

global air fares eased towards the end of 2015, the addi-tional decline in oil prices seen during the fi nal months of last year and into January is likely to provide further stimulus for air travel growth during the course of 2016, IATA said.

IATA director general and CEO Tony Tyler said, “Janu-ary maintained the strong traffi c growth trend seen in 2015, showing the resilience of demand for connectivity despite recent turmoil in equity markets. The record load factor is a result of strong demand for our product and airlines making the most productive use of their assets. Underly-ing conditions point to another strong year for passenger traffi c, with the latest decline in oil prices likely providing additional stimulus for air travel growth.”

BUSINESS

Gulf Times Wednesday, March 9, 20166

As Egypt’s dollar crisis deepens, push to cut imports casts shadow over economy ReutersCairo

Sami Khangy’s printing press has a

problem: finding paper. A dollar short-

age and import controls mean supply

is tight. Prices are rising, profits are

falling and uncertainty over the fate

of Egypt’s currency is clouding invest-

ment plans.

“They want to cut imports but there

are only two paper plants in the coun-

try and the quality is rubbish,” said

Khangy, sipping coff ee in the off ice at

his factory west of Cairo.

“We buy imported paper from

merchants. They struggle to get dol-

lars and raise the price from one week

to the next ... To fix the price now they

want dollars but who has dollars?”

Few in the business community

argue with Egypt’s push to preserve

scarce dollars by narrowing its trade

deficit, but many say a number of

policies announced in recent months

were imposed hastily and threaten to

undermine the economic growth that

Egypt needs to create jobs for its grow-

ing population.

Egypt has suff ered a shortfall in for-

eign currency since the 2011 uprising

that ousted Hosni Mubarak ushered in

years of turmoil that drove off foreign

investors and tourists, sources of forex

it needs to finance imports of every-

thing from wheat to consumer goods.

Foreign reserves have more than

halved since 2011 to $16.53bn in Febru-

ary, enough for only three months of

imports. As reserves fell sharply and

emerging markets crashed last year,

Egypt depreciated the pound by about

10%. It then strengthened the currency

by 20 piastres to 7.73 per dollar in

November and has held there since.

To crush a black market that flour-

ished in the uncertainty, the central

bank restricted forex movements, sap-

ping dollar liquidity from the market

and making it harder to open letters of

credit and clear imports, which have

piled up at ports.

In an eff ort to curb demand for forex

it says is wasted on needless goods, it

plans to cut imports by a quarter this

year. In the past three months alone,

Egypt has imposed rules requiring

importers to register source facto-

ries, provide import documents from

foreign banks and pay 100% cash de-

posits on letters of credit. It also raised

customs duties on more than 500

items, including apples and deodorant,

deemed luxuries.

But manufacturers and importers

alike say Egypt’s industrial base is in-

capable of meeting consumer demand

in a market of 90mn. In the best case,

they say, the policy will reduce choice

and competition. In the worst, it will

create shortages, inflate prices and

force small businesses to close.

“The policy of import substitu-

tion was popular during the period

of decolonisation ... It’s one of those

policies that looks good on paper but

doesn’t work,” said Timothy Kaldas, a

fellow at the Tahrir Institute for Middle

East Policy (TIMEP). “Lots of things are

imported because there is no alterna-

tive but also because they are cheaper

than domestic alternatives. There are

many imports poor people depend

on. Even if in theory local production

could pick up the slack it would take

time and in the meantime we could see

a sharp reduction in employment.”

Manufacturers say they want noth-

ing more than to nurture industries

and exports but forex controls are

proving a blunt instrument, hitting the

industrial base as firms big and small

struggle to obtain dollars to import

raw materials.

When restrictions were introduced

about a year ago, companies were

allowed to deposit only $50,000 a

month in the bank to open letters of

credit, with priority given to essential

foods, medicines, fuel and raw materi-

als. In January, the limit was raised to

$250,000 for essential products only.

Manufacturers say the definition of

essential is narrow, excluding coff ee

for instance, while they struggle to

persuade banks to prioritise some

components.

The problem has disrupted produc-

tion at some companies, with the auto-

motive sector among the worst hit.

GB Auto, Egypt’s largest-listed vehi-

cle assembler which employs 10,000

people, halted production for 20 days

last year because of delays clearing

component imports.

“The government wants to close

unnecessary imports of goods that

could be substituted locally but we

are one of the local producers,” said

GB Auto’s chief investment off icer

Menatallah Sadek.

Central Bank of Egypt’s headquarters is seen in Cairo. To crush a black market that flourished in the uncertainty, the central bank restricted forex movements, sapping dollar liquidity from the market and making it harder to open letters of credit and clear imports, which have piled up at ports.

Saudi retailer Jarir warns Q1 sales to fall by up to 30% ReutersDubai

One of Saudi Arabia’s biggest retailers, Jarir Marketing, warned yesterday that its

sales would plunge by as much as 30% in the fi rst quarter of this year, a sign of low oil prices weakening the kingdom’s economy.

“The company expects this decline will affect most de-partments, particularly elec-tronics because of lower sales of smartphones...as well as computers and peripherals,” Jarir said in a statement to the stock exchange.

The decline is partly because sales were unusually high in the fi rst quarter of 2015, when they hit 1.9bn riyals ($507mn) as King Salman granted a bonus of two months’ salary to state employ-ees to mark his accession to the throne.

But it is also due to state aus-terity measures in response to low oil prices, which caused the government to run a budget def-icit of nearly $100bn last year.

Jarir’s chairman Muhammad al-Agil told Reuters in January that government spending curbs had cut overtime payments and other bonuses to employees in the public sector, where most

Saudi citizens work, and may have reduced their income by about 10%.

Mazen al-Sudairi, head of re-search at al-Istithmar Capital, said that excluding the impact of last year’s royal bonus, Jarir’s sales were still expanding, but growth was clearly slowing because of the economic environment.

“The decline in consumer spending was widely expected and we have started to see signs of it over the past two or three months, but most of it is in the area of durable goods,” he said.

“It is normal that people spend less at times of concern over a slowdown. People will start to spend less on the number of times they dine at restaurants and so on...and defi nitely will think twice before they buy a new car or a Rolex watch.”

Sudairi said that while com-panies in the Saudi food and healthcare sectors would con-tinue to grow, fi rms such as durable goods retailer United Electronics (eXtra), clothing re-tailer Abdulaziz Alhokair Co and jeweller Ahmed Fitaihi Co could become vulnerable to slower consumer spending.

Jarir said that its plan to open at least six new stores in Saudi Arabia this year would not be af-fected by the drop in sales.

Attijariwafa Bank plans bid for Barclays’ Egypt business

ReutersDubai

Attijariwafa Bank, Morocco’s

largest bank by assets, plans to

bid for the Egyptian operations of

Barclays, a senior executive told

Reuters yesterday.

Barclays said last week it will

sell its Africa business as Chief

Executive Jes Staley attempts to

simplify the bank’s structure and

seek higher shareholder returns.

The British lender plans to

sell its 62% stake in Barclays

Africa Group over the next two

to three years. It will also sell its

separate operations in Egypt and

Zimbabwe.

“Egypt we will look at and we

already signalled that to Barclays.

Once the competitive process

starts we hope to receive the

documents and decide accord-

ingly,” Attijariwafa Bank General

Manager Ismail Douiri said in an

interview on the sidelines of an

event in Dubai.

Sources familiar with the sale

said the equity size of Barclays’

Egyptian unit was around

$400mn. Barclays has 56 branch-

es and serves around 127,000

customers in Egypt, where it first

established a foothold in 1864, ac-

cording to the bank’s website.

Attijariwafa has a presence

in 24 countries, including 14 in

Africa.

The bank has been keen to ex-

pand into Egypt for several years

and reached the final stages in

bidding for BNP Paribas’ Egyptian

retail business, which was eventu-

ally sold to Dubai bank Emirates

NBD in 2013, Douiri said.

He said Attijariwafa is not in-

terested in Barclays Africa Group

- which runs Absa in South Africa

and Barclays-branded operations

in a number of other countries

- as it would not likely off er a

majority stake and is largely

made up of South Africa, a highly

competitive market.

Attijariwafa, 48% controlled by

Moroccan royal family holding

SNI, aims to grow its net banking

income from outside Morocco to

30% over the next five years, from

27% now, he said.

Dubai developers keep building despite weak market , echoes of ’08ReutersDubai

Dubai developers are pressing ahead with their construction plans

despite expectations that prop-erty prices will fall yet further this year, undaunted by memo-ries of a 2008 crash.

Industry consultants say that while sales volumes have slumped in the emirate, struc-tural changes to the market such as tighter regulations to-gether with fewer speculators and developers should ensure a much softer landing this time.

But others worry about rip-ple eff ects from the dive in oil prices, even though Dubai is a small crude producer compared with fellow emirate Abu Dhabi, and wonder how all the projects that are being announced will be funded.

Dubai property prices have been more volatile in the past decade than in other centres.

Residential prices in the emirate fell 50% from a third-quarter 2008 peak to mid-2009, suff ering a second downturn in early 2010, industry consultants Cluttons estimate.

Prices then rebounded from 2011 following an infl ux of money and people displaced by uprisings in several Arab coun-tries, recovering to within 18% of 2008 peaks.

But values slipped again from late 2014. Cluttons reckons they fell 3-5% in 2015 and forecasts a similar drop this year; rivals CBRE say prices declined about 15% last year and predict anoth-er 10% drop in 2016.

Emaar Properties says it will not change its plans despite sales revenue falling 28% to 7.51bn dirhams ($2.04bn) in the fi rst nine months of 2015.

“Emaar is progressing as scheduled with all its projects launched,” said a spokesman for Emaar, builder of the world’s tallest tower, the Burj Khalifa.

The company, one of four big players in the Dubai market, has a backlog of projects worth 24.1bn dirhams in the wider United Arab Emirates.

“Sales enquiries have contin-ued to be robust, led by strong interest from regional and in-ternational investors,” said the

spokesman. Property markets can be driven as much by senti-ment as supply and demand, so such overt bullishness is per-haps understandable. However, it ignores a 19% decline in Dubai unit sales and a 24% drop in the combined sales value in 2015, CBRE estimates.

It also echoes 2008 when that October the developer Na-kheel announced plans to build a kilometre-high tower, which at almost 200 metres more than the Burj Khalifa would be a glo-bal record.

Barely a year later, Nakheel sought to restructure about $11bn in borrowings and prop-erty prices were in free fall. Today a Dubai metro station is named after the lofty project, but the tower has yet to mate-rialise.

Dubai has doubled property transaction fees and imposed tougher deposit requirements for mortgage borrowers.

While this has helped to prompt the current downtrend, infl icting such short-term pain may ultimately lessen volatility by minimising speculative trad-ing.

This marks a signifi cant change from 2008. “The dy-namics of the market this time

around are vastly diff erent ... The fundamentals are a lot stronger,” said Faisal Durrani, partner and head of research at Cluttons.

DAMAC Properties, Dubai’s largest independent developer, also says it has not slowed con-struction as there is demand waiting to be met.

“There will continue to be an under-supply of completed units in the market; based on Dubai’s economic growth, de-mand should outstrip supply,” said a DAMAC spokesman. “It’s very much business as usual.”

Dubai offi cials have remained optimistic on economic growth in the emirate which has diver-sifi ed into areas such as tourism more than larger oil exporters. In December, a government of-fi cial estimated 2015 growth at around four%, close to levels of recent years.

However, the UAE has said it will be hard to achieve growth of more than three% across the emirates this year.

The spectre of over-supply still haunts the property mar-ket after the crash, which was partly due to an abundance of units being completed almost at the same time. To avoid a repeat, developers are widely

thought to delay handing over units when they are completed, although of course this means they get no money from them until a sale goes ahead.

Over the last fi ve years only about 35% of residential units slated for handover in a given year were delivered to buyers, consultants JLL estimates, with sales delayed until subsequent years.

Oil is thought to constitute only about 4-5% of Dubai’s economy, but the eff ect of the crude price slump will be great-er than this fi gure implies.

“There’s a ripple eff ect (into) offi ce demand, the amount of trade hotels get, business activity, amount of fl ights, retail spend,” said Alan Robertson, JLL’s Mena chief executive.

Lower oil receipts have tight-ened liquidity. Government de-posits in the UAE banking sys-tem fell by 56bn dirhams in the 12 months to September 2015, National Bank of Abu Dhabi re-ported.

“This will have a direct im-pact on the mortgage market, which is already very restric-tive,” said Clutton’s Durrani.

Project funding is likely to be a problem this year.

“There are a lot of new

projects being announced but where are they all going to get the money from?” said Craig Plumb, JLL Mena head of re-search. Of the four developers that dominate in Dubai, three - Emaar, Nakheel and Du-bai Properties - are ultimately state-controlled, making it eas-ier to coordinate supply.

Currency fl uctuations are another factor. Foreigners ac-counted for four-fi fths of the combined value of Dubai prop-erty purchases in 2015, CBRE says, with Indians, Britons and Pakistanis among the biggest non-Emirati buyers.

The dollar, against which the UAE dirham is pegged, has gained about a fi fth versus the euro and sterling since mid-2014. The Indian rupee has like-wise lost ground.

This has made Dubai prop-erty more expensive for poten-tial buyers with money in those currencies, but has also off set the drop in values for existing owners from those currency zones.

“People who really want to sell are willing to accept consid-erably lower prices,” said Alex-ander von Sayn-Wittgenstein, sales director at luxury property broker Luxhabitat.

“The offi cial price may be the same but when a buyer makes an off er that is much lower, the seller is more fl exible and will likely accept a price they wouldn’t have a year ago.”

Gulf property markets have generally weakened although Dubai is most volatile because it has made the biggest gains.

“The underlying factors are broadly the same - such as oil prices, lower state spending and the need for governments to raise taxes which will add to in-fl ationary pressures,” said JLL’s Plumb.

Most analysts predict Dubai’s hosting of the Expo 2020 exhi-bition will help the residential market bottom out over the next 12 months. Demographic trends are also favourable, with the city’s population forecast to double to 5mn by 2030.

If correct, this will help con-struction. “We (would) need another city the size of current Dubai,” said Durrani. “This sug-gests that Dubai’s development story still has a long way to go.”

BUSINESS7Gulf Times


Bearish factors in metalsindustryseen intact

ReutersMelbourne

Goldman Sachs said yes-terday that the structural factors that have driven a

bear market in metals remain in place as there is little prospect of improvement in Chinese de-mand.

The rally in metals since the start of this year has been on the back of a pick-up in Chinese credit in January and a depreci-ating US dollar that pushed in-vestors to cover short positions, rather than because of any re-covery in the real economy, the bank said.

“We fi nd that the likelihood of a sustained improvement in Chinese demand during 2016/17 is low, and we remain strongly of the view that the structural bear market drivers ... remain intact,” Goldman said in a research note.

The investment bank also this week poured cold water over a rally in iron ore prices, saying that the steelmaking ingredi-ent was destined to retrace gains without a signifi cant improve-ment in steel demand from top consumer China.

Iron ore has risen more than 22% this year, making it the best performing commodity so far in 2016.

Base metals aren’t far behind, with zinc up 11%, and copper and aluminium up around 5% for the year so far.

“The rally in prices since mid-January has ... brought with it questions regarding whether Chinese activity and metals demand will actually improve, and whether any improvement would be sustained,” Goldman said.

“Physical metal indicators have not pointed to any notable improvement in activity during 2016.”

Goldman said it expected fresh headwinds from China and emerging market deleveraging, more dollar strength, mining cost defl ation, and strong supply growth particularly in copper.

Improvement in credit in Chi-na was not angled towards older industries such as manufactur-ing but rather towards stimu-lating services and higher con-sumption sectors, which are less metal intensive, it said.

The bank added that growing hopes for metals demand due to a pick-up in China’s property mar-ket were also misplaced given that construction remained weak.

For copper in particular, sup-ply risks were easing following solid rainfall in Zambia in Febru-ary, while the recent price rally was likely to entice scrap dealers to sell their stock, the bank said.

It also recommended that producers and investors with longer-term horizons start hedging strategies and con-sider short positions in copper and aluminium over the coming month.

“Specifically, we fore-cast circa 18-20% downside for these metals prices on a 12-month view, with prices ex-pected to fall to $4,000/t and $1,350/t respectively.”

Vale in deal with Fortescue to set up joint venturesBloombergMelbourne

Amid a record gain in iron ore prices, Vale SA, the world’s big-gest producer, has signed an ac-

cord with Fortescue Metals Group that could see the Brazilian company take a minority stake in the Australian miner owned by billionaire Andrew Forrest.

The agreement gives Brazil’s Vale the option to buy as much as 15% of Fortescue, the Perth-based company’s Chief Executive Offi cer Neville Power said yesterday on a conference call. That would be worth about A$1.3bn ($965mn) based on yesterday’s close, according to Bloomberg calculations. The accord also allows the companies to form joint ventures and develop new mines.

Iron ore soared the most ever Mon-day after China’s policy makers sig-nalled their willingness to buttress eco-nomic growth, boosting the outlook for steel consumption in the top consum-er. A joint venture between Vale and Fortescue to blend iron ore at Chinese ports may begin within six months and deliver about 80mn to 100mn metric tonnes of the steel-making ingredient, Power told reporters.

“Vale was already off ering probably what could be considered the cheapest iron ore shipment price, and it stream-lines their off ering into China,” Evan Lucas, a market strategist in Melbourne at IG, said by phone. “It gives Vale en-try into the Australian market that it didn’t have.” Fortescue is the fourth-ranked iron ore supplier.

Fortescue’s shares fell 9.4% in Syd-ney to close at A$2.79. Rival iron ore supplier BHP Billiton fell 1.8%. Power told reporters that Fortescue’s 24% ad-vance on Monday was in line with other producers and refl ected the rise in iron ore prices. Vale rose 9% in Brazil on Monday.

Fortescue has surged 49% this year, boosted by eff orts to cut costs and plans to make further reductions to its $6.1bn debt pile.

Talks with Vale have been ongo-ing for about a year, Power said, and

Fortescue has held initial talks with regulators over their accord.

The pact will allow the companies “to work together to deliver long term value to our customers, through the ef-fi cient supply of an attractive and com-petitive new iron ore blend in China,” Power said yesterday in a statement. Vale said in December it forecasts iron ore production in 2016 of 340mn to 350mn tonnes, while Fortescue expects to hold exports at an annual rate of about 165mn tonnes.

Vale last month fl agged it data-des-tination planned more dramatic action to cut $10bn of debt, including the pos-sible sale of some of the company’s key assets. It had previously been focused

on cost cutting, moving to higher-quality deposits and selling less- im-portant assets to withstand lower com-modities prices.

David Wang, a Chicago-based ana-lyst with Morningstar Investment, struck a note of caution on the timing of any Vale purchase.

“Any stake is unlikely to happen in the next couple of years since Vale doesn’t really have the capital to do so at this point,” he said. “In fact, the company is selling assets in order to be able to fund its expansion project. If there is an agreement to buy a stake it would be a couple years out.”

For Wang, the benefi t of the tie-up lies in blending Vale’s higher grade product

with Fortescue’s lower grade. “Vale’s premium product isn’t really getting the extra value they would be expecting right now, so this helps them avoid sell-ing a premium product when they aren’t getting the full value,” he said.

The producer’s Samarco joint ven-ture with BHP Billiton this month sealed an accord with Brazilian au-thorities over a tailings dam spill in November that killed at least 17 people. Samarco will pay at least $1.1bn over the next three years under the deal.

Iron ore has powered higher in 2016 and jumped 19% Monday, the biggest one-day surge in daily data since 2009, to defy forecasts that it would post fur-ther losses as mounting low-cost sup-

ply from Australia and Brazil collides with weakening demand for steel in China. Investors are expecting further monetary easing by Chinese authori-ties, according to China Merchants Futures Co Signs of property-price growth in Chinese cities is viewed as positive for metals prices, according to Sanford C Bernstein & Co.

“My strongest view would be that this deal could be to allow them to better control prices,” Gordon John-son, a New York-based analyst at Axiom Capital Management said by phone. “The second reaction would be for Fortescue, they are doing this as they see the need for cash later down the line.”

Crushed iron ore slips on a conveyor belt at Vale’s Brucutu mine in Brazil. Amid a record gain in iron ore prices, Vale has signed an accord with Fortescue Metals Group that could see the Brazilian company take a minority stake in the Australian miner owned by billionaire Andrew Forrest.

Surging iron ore price reflects a new market reality ReutersLondon

The price of iron ore rocketed 20% on Monday to

$62.60 per tonne. With year-to-date gains of 46%,

it has performed better than any other industrial

commodity. Why?

Iron ore often enjoys something of a bounce

after the Chinese Lunar New Year as steel mills in

the country stock up ahead of the spring construc-

tion season.

This seasonal uptick in purchasing activity also

often coincides with a slight slowdown in supply,

both in China itself and in key origin countries such

as Australia.

These “normal” drivers, however, don’t really

explain the ferocity of the rally.

Rather, the simplest explanation is that iron ore

is following steel prices, which have also rocketed

in China. Shanghai-traded rebar is up by 20% on the

start of the year and went limit-up on Monday.

Higher steel prices will incentivise higher produc-

tion run-rates, implying higher demand for iron ore.

But why have steel prices shot up?

That’s where things get a bit trickier to explain, at

least in terms of traditional fundamental drivers.

But that maybe is the point. Both steel and iron

ore are showing every sign of joining the rest of the

commodities club, where financial drivers can be

just as important as good old supply and demand.

If iron ore’s rapid ascent has surprised many

commentators, the surge in Chinese steel prices

is even more surprising. Despite much political

“noise” from Beijing about supporting China’s flag-

ging economic growth rate and cutting excess steel

capacity, there is no clear indication of any short-

term turnaround in Chinese steel demand.

Construction remains a net drag while the

broader manufacturing sector is also tangibly

struggling, witness the continued weakness of both

Chinese purchasing managing indices.

It’s this missing ingredient that has generated a

flurry of warnings from big banks such as Goldman

Sachs that the jump in iron ore prices is unsustain-

able.

And from a fundamental perspective, it’s hard to

disagree with them.

Indeed, the iron ore rally may be a swap of short-

term gain for long-term pain, if it encourages the

reactivation of higher-cost supply in a chronically

over-supplied market.

A similar point could be made for steel. After all,

China is already making too much steel and export-

ing too much steel, stoking trade tensions across

the world.

If unmatched by any jump in end-use demand,

any extra Chinese steel units are simply going

to flow outwards, crushing production rates and

prices elsewhere.

If you’re looking for a fundamental justification

for what’s happening to both Chinese steel and iron

ore prices, you’re going to struggle.

Rather, this is as much about the market itself as

about market drivers.

Because without anyone really paying too much

attention, trading activity on both the Shanghai

Futures Exchange (steel) and the Dalian Exchange

(iron ore) has gone stratospheric in recent months.

In Shanghai the step-change in activity is clearest

to see on the hot rolled coil (HRC) contract, which

now complements the longer-established rebar

contract.

Both volumes and market open interest on HRC

have exploded since the start of the (Western) year.

Rebar volumes and open interest, meanwhile, are

also still growing at a fast pace.

Average daily iron ore volumes on Dalian,

meanwhile, grew from 1.95mn lots in the first nine

months of 2015 to 2.67mn in the fourth quarter and

are currently running at 3.48mn tonnes so far this

year.

Market open interest has mushroomed over the

last six months. It currently stands at over 2.1mn

lots. This time last year it was just 748,000 lots.

There are even signs that Dalian prices are start-

ing to lead spot import prices.

This marks the full coming-of-age of a market

where pricing was once set annually in bench-

mark talks between the world’s biggest iron ore

producers and their biggest steel-mill buyers. That

old benchmark system was brought down by the

turbulence created by the Global Financial Crisis.

The world’s key iron ore suppliers now largely

priced on a quarterly or spot basis.

It’s that tectonic change in pricing that has

spawned thriving iron ore futures markets in both

China and Singapore.

But futures markets are available to all, unlike the

closed-door benchmark talks of old.

And it’s quite clear a new breed of Chinese player

has joined the iron ore pricing table.

The same phenomenon was seen last year in

the base metal contracts traded on the Shanghai

Futures Exchange (SHFE).

Volumes in previously shunned contracts such as

aluminium and lead have surged. The SHFE’s new

nickel contract regularly records volumes in excess

of those traded on the long-established London

Metal Exchange.

Last year will go down as the year in which the

Chinese retail investor got interested in industrial

commodities.

Powerful, cash rich hedge funds have led the

charge, sucking in behind them what might best be

described as a retail investment crowd.

Many are day traders. Volume to open interest ra-

tios across the SHFE metals contracts are extremely

high by the standards of Western commodity

markets such as CME or the LME.

Andy Home is a columnist for Reuters. The opinions

expressed are those of the author.

Junk status conceals gems among EM corporate bonds BloombergLondon

Don’t be fooled by their junk sta-tus, many emerging-market corporate bonds are safer than

they look.High-yield notes in developing

countries have a better credit rating on average than their peers in advanced nations as a spate of sovereign down-grades last year pushed higher-quality borrowers like Brazil’s Petroleo Bra-sileiro and Russia’s Sberbank into their fold. That’s prompted investors from Aviva to Ashmore Group to say emerg-ing-market junk bonds off er superior value and it’s time to start buying them again.

Money managers argue the compa-nies are more immune to defaults than their ratings suggest because govern-ments would rush to their rescue in

times of distress. That’s a backstop borrowers in richer nations are less likely to get. Of the 20 issuers that missed bond payments this year, only one came from the developing world, Standard & Poor’s said in a report.

“Emerging-market high yield is now safer than developed high yield,” said Anton Kerkenezov, a corporate debt money manager who helps oversee about $3.5bn of developing- country assets at Aviva Investors in London. “While there is a lot of concern about defaults in the US energy-sector bonds, emerging-market corporates are more resilient.”

The Bloomberg High-Yield Emerg-ing-Market Corporate Bond Index has swelled almost 20% by market value in the past 12 months as investment-grade companies from Brazil to Rus-sia joined its ranks amid a plunge in oil prices toward a 12-year low. S&P downgraded about 50 developing-

nation companies to junk during that time, with the majority coming from South America, according to data com-piled by Bloomberg.

“It’s a good time to fi nd cheap as-sets,” Nuria Jorba, a credit analyst at Union Bancaire Privee Ubp, a wealth manager that oversees $94bn, said from Zurich. “Recently there has been negative sentiment towards emerging-market corporates, but that doesn’t mean that all of those bonds are at risk of default.”

The inclusion of “fallen angels,” or issuers that lost their investment-grade status but have a low probability of default, has helped to improve the average creditworthiness of the junk universe.

The Bank of America Merrill Lynch High Yield US Emerging Markets Cor-porate Plus Index is rated three steps be-low investment grade, one level higher than the bank’s developed- nation spec-

ulative bond gauge. Some 22% bonds in the developing index are rated one notch below investment grade, compared with 15% in the advanced gauge.

The yield spread between the two classes has also narrowed by 40% in the past 12 months. Emerging-market junk bonds trade at an average yield of 9.51%, compared with 7.82% for devel-oped high-yield debt. The gap was 3.94 percentage points a year ago.

“Many EM high-yield issuers are owned fully or partially by their gov-ernments, and as a result have been downgraded not for credit deteriora-tion but rather as a result of their re-spective country’s downgrade,” Brigitte Posch, the head of emerging- market corporate debt at Babson Capital Man-agement in London, said by e-mail.

Around 80% of emerging-market speculative-grade energy companies by market capitalization are quasi-sovereigns, meaning they may receive

fi nancing help from states and their banks if the oil-price slump hurts their ability to service debts, Jan Dehn, the head of research at Ashmore, said in a research note last month.

There’s still room for pessimism. Fitch Ratings projected this year that defaults by emerging-market compa-nies will increase as they face dollar-debt repayments of more than $5.6bn in the next three years at a time when higher US interest rates are reducing investors’ risk appetite. The number of developing-country Eurobonds trad-ing below 60 cents a dollar has more than doubled in the past year.

The concerns are overblown, ac-cording to Ashmore’s Dehn.

“EM corporates off er a superior val-ue proposition: far better quality for roughly the same yield,” he said. “Many international investors are now under-weight and looking for the right entry point back into the market.”

BUSINESS


Emerging stocks snap 7-day winning streak ReutersLondon

Emerging market stocks retreated from 10-week highs yesterday after export numbers from China fell, whilst a significant widening of South Africa’s current account deficit pushed the rand more than 1% lower. MSCI’s benchmark emerging equity index fell 0.65%, snapping a seven-day winning streak after China’s February trade data showed exports falling 25.4% year-on-year, the biggest drop since May 2009. “There is a bit of a pullback and the China numbers overnight have probably contributed to that,” said Manik Narain, emerging markets strategist at UBS. He added that the market could be taking a tactical break ahead of Thursday’s European Central Bank meeting to see if it will meet expectations for the risk rally to continue. Chinese mainland shares closed marginally up, but Hong Kong stocks lost 0.7%. The mood was more bullish in central Europe due to expectations of more ECB easing, and Budapest’s equity index leapt to a six-year high, led by its biggest lender OTP Bank. Bank stocks also rose in Warsaw, including Pekao and Alior which sources say is in talks to buy its rival Bank BPH from General Electric. The broader index was 0.5% lower however.

The South African rand lost over 1% against the dollar after the current account deficit widened to 5.1% of GDP in the fourth quarter, much bigger than economists’ expectations for a 4.35% gap. William Jackson, senior EM economist, said this highlighted the country’s external vulnerabilities. “There’s little sign so far that the weakness of the rand has boosted exporters,” he added, referring to the currency’s 30%-plus loss against the dollar since mid-2013. The Russian rouble retreated 0.6% from 2016 highs hit on Monday as oil prices edged lower after Kuwait said it would only agree to an output freeze if all major producers take part. Russian local markets are shut for a holiday. But Brent crude is still holding above $40 a barrel after Monday’s 5.5% surge but Goldman Sachs has poured cold water over the prospects for a sustained rally. The Hungarian forint fell more than 1% to the euro after January trade surplus and February consumer inflation came in below forecast, cementing expectations of more policy easing. The Czech crown firmed a touch however on a continued improvement of the trade surplus in January. The Turkish lira eased 0.2%, despite a stronger-than-expected 5.6% rise in industrial production in January.

Sentiment turns bearish on Asia markets AFPTokyo

Asian markets mostly fell yes-terday, with investors cash-ing in after enjoying their best

rally so far this year, as China released data showing another hefty slump in exports.

In Tokyo, the Nikkei 225 down 0.8% at 16,783.15 points; Shanghai – com-posite up 0.1% at 2,901.39 points and Hong Kong - Hang Seng down 0.7% at 20,011.58 points at the close yes-terday.

Profi t-takers made the most of the latest surge in prices that has come on the back of upbeat US data and hopes that China will take further steps to kick start the world’s number-two economy. China’s exports dived more than a quarter on-year in February, new data showed yesterday, while im-ports were almost 14% off —far worse than analysts forecast.

The numbers are the latest to high-light weakness in the economy, al-though offi cials pointed out that they were skewed by the Chinese New Year holiday that saw factories shut down for a week.

However, Frederic Neumann, co-head of Asian economic research at HSBC Holdings in Hong Kong, said: “Exports got pummelled again in February, highlighting the downturn in global demand.

“It’s easy to blame Chinese New Year distortions, but there is a much deeper malaise that is becoming ap-parent in the numbers.”

Shanghai stocks, which slumped more than 2% at one point, ended 0.1% higher while Hong Kong ended 0.7% down.

The Chinese customs data was re-

leased as the nation’s leaders hold their annual policy gathering, which started Saturday with Premier Li Ke-qiang targeting 6.5 to 7% economic growth this year.

The lower and wider band indicates leaders accept the tough work ahead as they look to recalibrate the giant economy from one dependent on ex-ports and investment to domestic-driven growth.

In Japan, adjusted fi gures showed the world’s number-three economy contracted slightly less than fi rst thought in the fi nal three months of 2015. But the tweak was scant conso-lation for Prime Minister Shinzo Abe,

whose big-spending, loose monetary policy blitz to reinvigorate the econo-my has been called into question by a series of disappointing readings.

“We cannot take a positive view (on the revised data)... There is no change to our outlook that the economy is stagnant,” said Junichi Makino, chief economist at SMBC Nikko Securities.

The news will put fresh focus on the Bank of Japan when it meets next week, with expectations it will further loosen monetary policy.

Despite the prospect of fresh cash being pumped into the fi nancial sys-tem the yen ticked higher against the dollar. The greenback bought ¥112.99

in afternoon trade, against ¥113.41 in New York.

That hit exporters on the Nikkei index, which ended down 0.8%. “We might be experiencing a bit of exu-berance,” Michael McCarthy, chief market strategist at CMC Markets Asia Pacifi c in Sydney, told Bloomb-erg News.

“Japanese markets have gone up signifi cantly, making it vulnerable for a correction.

The GDP has acted as a trigger for the selloff in Tokyo.” Other regional markets were also in negative territo-ry, with Sydney off 0.7% by the close and Seoul down 0.6%.

A businessman rides a bicycle past an electronic quotation board in Tokyo. The Nikkei 225 closed down 0.8% at 16,783.15 points yesterday.

China bond rally at risk as premier’s growthcall threatens debt fl ood BloombergShanghai

China’s eight-quarter-long bond rally is facing the twin threat of in-creased sales and reduced demand

as the nation’s leaders intensify eff orts to stimulate growth in the world’s second-largest economy.

A decision over the weekend to widen the government’s fi scal defi cit to a record 3% from last year’s 2.3% will spur a surge in debt issuance that will push up yields, said China Merchants Securities Co ana-lyst Sun Binbin. Accelerating infl ation and a jump in credit that is seen as positive for the economy are other factors that bond investors need to consider, according to Haitong Securities Co.

The Bloomberg China Sovereign Bond Index has risen every quarter since the beginning of 2014, handing investors a re-turn of 20% through the end of last year, compared with 7% for US Treasuries. The People’s Bank of China has cut inter-est rates six times since November 2014 and eased reserve- requirement ratios. Record-low interest rates prompted in-

vestors to borrow more, driving total debt to 247% of gross domestic product in 2015 and 10-year sovereign yields to the least in seven years.

“Given the various pro-growth meas-ures, the economy is likely to stabilise later this year, driving up infl ation and weighing on the bond market,” said Wei Taiyuan, an investment manager at China Merchants Bank Co in Shanghai. “Yields are already very low and challenges to the economy have already been priced in. The bond market will probably trade range bound at best.”

The yield on the benchmark 10-year sovereign note fell 173 basis points in the last two years and touched a seven-year low of 2.72% on January 13, ChinaBond data show.

The yield on notes due January 2026 climbed one basis point to a one-month high of 2.95% in Shanghai, according to National Interbank Funding Center pric-es.

Premier Li Keqiang is trying to resus-citate an economy growing at the slowest pace in 25 years, while seeking to avoid runaway credit expansion that would risk fi nancial instability.

Speaking at the National People’s Con-gress this weekend, he outlined a 6.5% to 7% growth range for this year, with 6.5% pegged as the baseline through 2020. That would be less than last year’s 6.9% expan-sion, which was the least since 1990.

Central government debt will grow 18% this year, up from 11% in 2015, while gross municipal bond issuance will jump 63%, according to Bloomberg calculations based on budget projections.

Local government bond sales will in-crease to 1.18tn yuan from 600bn yuan last year. This is in addition to about 5tn yuan of regional debt due this year that will be swapped into municipal notes. The swap programme was 3.2tn yuan last year.

“A larger fi scal defi cit, both nominal and actual, together with more bond is-suance and other innovative fi scal expan-sionary measures, refl ects a signifi cant expansion of fi scal policy,” Qu Hongbin, Hong Kong-based chief China econo-mist at HSBC Holdings, wrote in a note on Monday. “This will provide greater support to the fi nancing needs of infra-structure projects, which holds the key to stabilise growth.”

The nation’s broadest measure of new

credit surged to a record 3.42tn yuan in January as a seasonal lending binge co-incided with a recovery in the property industry.

Home prices in Shenzhen, China’s southern business centre in Guangdong province, have jumped 52% over the past year, while those in Shanghai surged 18%. In a report released March 5, policy makers set the M2 money supply expan-sion target at 13%, compared with last year’s 12%.

Keeping the monetary base target markedly above nominal gross domestic product growth points to a further in-crease in leverage in the economy which risks raising contingent liabilities for the government, according to Marie Diron, senior vice president at Moody’s Investors Service. The rating fi rm last week lowered China’s credit-rating outlook to negative from stable.

“A bigger increase in money supply will translate into larger demand for assets, including property and commodities,” said Ji Tianhe, a Beijing-based analyst at Founder Cifco Futures Co. “Among all the choices, bonds are the least attractive, as the current yields are too low.”

Li: Seeking to avoid runaway credit expansion that would risk financial instability.

Sensex steady; rupee declines BloombergMumbai

Indian stocks closed little changed in vola-

tile trading as some investors judged the

benchmark index’s best weekly advance in

more than four years as excessive.

Maruti Suzuki India and Hindustan

Unilever slid for a third day. State Bank of

India halted a six-day, 24% surge. Reliance

Industries, owner of the world’s largest

refining complex, rose to a five-week high.

NMDC, the largest iron-ore miner, climbed

to a seven-month high after the price of

the raw material soared by a record.

The S&P BSE Sensex rose less than 0.1%

at the close in Mumbai, swinging between a

gain and a loss of 0.6% during the session.

The gauge capped its biggest weekly gain

since December 2011 on Friday, as foreign-

ers bought a net $991mn of shares in the

first four days of March. The rally sent its

14-day relative strength index to 60, close to

the 70 level that signals to some traders a

security is overbought. Indian markets were

shut on Monday for a holiday.

“If you have that kind of returns on the

table in a week’s time, it is mouth-watering to

take some money off the table,” said Gaurang

Shah, vice president at Geojit BNP Paribas

Financial Services. “The rally was ferocious.”

Shares rallied after Finance Minister

Arun Jaitley in his February 29 budget

aff irmed the government’s goal of cutting

the fiscal deficit to a nine-year low of 3.5%

of gross domestic product in the year

starting April 1. The administration plans

to boost spending on roads, ports, power

plants and other public projects, while in-

creasing allocation to a rural jobs program.

Maruti Suzuki declined 2.6% to its lowest

since February 29. Hindustan Unilever fell

2.7%, the most since February 23. State

Bank slid 2.7% and ICICI Bank retreated

1.7%. Reliance gained 2.1% to its highest

level since February 1. NMDC surged 6.1%.

Steel Authority of India soared 8%, extend-

ing last week’s 15% gain. The stock was the

top performer on the S&P BSE Metal Index,

which rose to its highest level in almost five

months. Oil & Natural Gas Corp increased

for a fourth day.

Iron ore became the latest commod-

ity to join the rally, soaring the most ever

on Monday after Chinese policy makers

signalled their willingness to buttress

economic growth. The raw material’s 19%

jump follows copper’s move back above

$5,000 a ton on Friday, while oil has hit a

two-month high. Gold is at the highest in a

year and platinum has crashed back above

$1,000 an ounce.

Meanwhile the rupee halted a six-day

advance on speculation some investors

judged the currency’s gains to be exces-

sive. The rupee dropped 0.4%, the most

since February 16, to 67.3450 a dollar in

Mumbai, prices from local banks compiled

by Bloomberg show. The dollar’s 14-day

relative-strength index versus the rupee

was at 33.6 on Friday, near the 30 level

that indicates to some traders a reversal

is likely. Indian markets were shut on

Monday for a local holiday. A gauge of 20

emerging- market currencies declined for

the first time in seven days as data showed

Japan’s economy and Chinese exports are

shrinking.

“We saw an extended rupee rally and

some depreciation was required,” said Gaurav

Sharma, a senior currency analyst at Religare

Commodities in Noida, near New Delhi. “Weak

export data from China too wasn’t supportive”

of regional currencies, he said.

The rupee jumped 2.4% in the previous

six days and rose to a seven-week high of

67.0850 on Friday as foreign funds boost-

ed holdings of local stocks amid a revival in

global sentiment for equities. The inflows

followed February 29 budget announce-

ments by Finance Minister Arun Jaitley,

including retaining the government’s goal

of narrowing the fiscal deficit to a nine-year

low and boosting spending on roads, ports,

power plants and other public projects.

LATEST MARKET CLOSING FIGURES

9Gulf TimesWednesday, March 9, 2016

BUSINESS

Zad Holding CoWidam Food CoVodafone Qatar

United Development CoSalam International Investme

Islamic Holding Group-RtsQatar & Oman Investment Co

Qatar NavigationQatar National Cement Co

Qatar National BankQatar Islamic Insurance

Qatar Industrial ManufacturQatar International Islamic

Qatari Investors GroupQatar Islamic Bank

Qatar Gas Transport(Nakilat)Qatar General Insurance & ReQatar German Co For Medical

Qatar Fuel QscQatar Electricity & Water CoQatar Cinema & Film Distrib

Qatar Insurance CoOoredoo Qsc

National LeasingMazaya Qatar Real Estate Dev

Mesaieed Petrochemical HoldiAl Meera Consumer Goods Co

Medicare GroupMannai Corporation Qsc

Masraf Al RayanAl Khalij Commercial Bank

Industries QatarIslamic Holding Group

Gulf Warehousing CompanyGulf International Services

Ezdan Holding GroupDoha Insurance Co

Doha Bank QscDlala Holding

Commercial Bank QscBarwa Real Estate Co

Al Khaleej Takaful Group

73.50

45.90

10.50

21.58

12.41

0.00

11.45

94.40

81.60

138.40

66.50

40.50

67.00

29.55

102.40

22.60

53.00

10.33

163.50

206.00

28.25

88.50

86.00

12.13

11.67

17.71

185.00

95.50

94.20

37.45

17.42

107.70

53.60

43.30

31.50

14.60

19.25

41.00

12.16

43.70

37.40

24.85

0.00

0.22

-1.33

-0.88

-0.64

0.00

-1.31

0.11

0.37

0.43

2.26

1.73

1.49

9.98

-2.34

0.44

0.00

-0.87

-2.39

0.00

0.00

0.00

1.28

-1.07

-0.60

-0.56

2.16

0.31

0.00

-1.60

0.63

-1.58

-1.68

1.62

1.59

-1.51

-0.52

0.61

8.06

-2.29

0.27

-0.40

-

4,500

172,320

1,538,806

568,402

-

136,341

32,826

3,244

88,798

1,300

11,087

423,442

663,944

236,708

437,352

-

13,026

89,158

-

-

-

74,416

238,351

235,441

155,666

16,277

6,346

21,207

2,108,035

164,061

371,090

17,693

55,182

2,136,928

207,439

11,216

203,461

467,187

43,842

1,734,248

28,819

QATAR

Company Name Lt Price % Chg Volume

United Wire Factories CompanEtihad Etisalat Co

Dar Al Arkan Real Estate DevSaudi Hollandi Bank

Rabigh Refining And PetrocheBanque Saudi Fransi

Saudi Enaya Cooperative InsuMediterranean & Gulf Insuran

Saudi British BankMohammad Al Mojil Group Co

Red Sea Housing Services CoTakween Advanced Industries

Sabb TakafulSaudi Arabian Fertilizer Co

National GypsumSaudi Ceramic Co

National Gas & IndustrializaSaudi Pharmaceutical Industr

ThimarNational Industrialization C

Saudi Transport And InvestmeSaudi Electricity Co

Saudi Arabia Refineries CoArriyadh Development Company

Al-Baha Development & InvestSaudi Research And MarketingAldrees Petroleum And Transp

Saudi Vitrified Clay Pipe CoJarir Marketing Co

Arab National BankYanbu National Petrochemical

Arabian CementMiddle East Specialized Cabl

Al Khaleej Training And EducAl Sagr Co-Operative Insuran

Trade Union Cooperative InsuArabia Insurance Cooperative

Saudi Chemical CompanyFawaz Abdulaziz Alhokair & C

Bupa Arabia For CooperativeWafa Insurance

Jabal Omar Development CoSaudi Basic Industries Corp

Saudi Kayan Petrochemical CoEtihad Atheeb Telecommunicat

Co For Cooperative InsuranceNational Petrochemical Co

Gulf Union Cooperative InsurGulf General Cooperative Ins

Basic Chemical IndustriesSaudi Steel Pipe Co

Buruj Cooperative InsuranceMouwasat Medical Services Co

Southern Province Cement CoMaadaniyah

Yamama Cement CoJazan Development Co

Zamil Industrial InvestmentAlujain Corporation (Alco)

Tabuk Agricultural DevelopmeUnited Co-Operative Assuranc

Qassim Cement/TheSaudi Advanced Industries

Kingdom Holding CoSaudi Arabian Amiantit Co

Al Jouf Agriculture DevelopmSaudi Industrial Development

Bishah AgricultureRiyad Bank

The National Agriculture DevHalwani Bros Co

Arabian Pipes CoEastern Province Cement Co

Al Qassim Agricultural CoFiling & Packing Materials M

Saudi Cable CoTihama Advertising & Public

Saudi Investment Bank/TheAstra Industrial Group

Saudi Public Transport CoTaiba Holding Co

Saudi Industrial Export CoSaudi Real Estate Co

Saudia Dairy & Foodstuff CoNational Shipping Co Of/The

Methanol Chemicals CoAce Arabia Cooperative Insur

Mobile Telecommunications CoSaudi Arabian Coop Ins Co

Axa Cooperative InsuranceAlsorayai Group

Weqaya For Takaful InsuranceBank Albilad

Al-Hassan G.I. Shaker CoWataniya Insurance Co

Abdullah Al Othaim MarketsHail Cement

17.01

22.37

4.50

24.11

9.04

22.81

9.62

16.51

20.19

12.55

20.47

20.15

22.24

65.49

12.59

35.90

20.41

28.77

33.04

8.16

51.85

14.50

32.56

17.90

13.50

39.30

37.95

82.00

121.21

18.13

31.73

45.03

6.33

21.76

26.05

13.19

5.94

43.70

43.86

102.89

6.40

47.50

70.45

4.90

4.30

69.39

12.94

7.95

13.07

20.47

17.39

17.05

105.89

68.96

23.31

28.30

10.75

27.06

10.76

9.61

8.82

64.03

9.63

11.25

8.57

22.60

8.92

69.75

11.10

18.29

64.86

8.89

34.16

9.57

33.33

6.29

35.41

15.06

15.23

10.52

32.95

46.56

16.97

124.55

35.53

5.30

39.15

5.75

15.27

12.30

10.51

19.39

22.76

22.90

46.85

82.42

12.05

3.59

2.95

-0.22

0.29

0.22

-1.71

1.05

6.93

-0.59

0.00

1.59

9.87

0.45

-0.64

4.92

2.20

0.49

0.10

-0.48

-0.61

-1.74

0.00

0.93

2.11

0.00

-1.48

3.01

2.18

-0.14

0.44

-2.27

0.11

0.48

-0.09

5.34

1.38

0.68

4.12

-1.21

-2.58

0.63

-1.10

-0.71

-2.45

9.69

0.49

0.15

0.63

1.24

4.65

1.40

10.00

0.27

0.42

-2.67

0.00

3.56

2.62

1.22

1.26

3.04

-0.71

1.26

0.27

-0.23

0.71

1.36

0.00

-0.09

2.01

0.29

3.49

0.89

0.63

1.58

2.28

-3.41

-0.73

3.39

0.67

0.21

3.44

0.18

-0.45

-1.58

-0.75

1.50

1.95

2.76

2.76

3.44

0.00

-0.26

1.55

-0.47

-1.70

-0.41

536,010

1,708,297

10,838,562

98,671

2,828,103

57,249

999,721

3,038,581

41,944

-

1,020,657

1,621,210

815,700

356,478

2,455,270

758,156

37,620

232,553

1,398,349

1,583,429

858,605

509,488

572,392

2,073,963

-

814,839

421,650

28,235

25,599

128,354

592,832

167,740

2,010,282

475,166

2,249,767

756,001

501,921

451,908

441,754

100,493

1,121,567

428,402

7,582,861

24,001,040

20,000,393

59,994

790,630

437,695

680,643

819,282

455,274

2,362,309

28,590

37,583

3,331,523

372,949

2,331,534

623,091

1,315,548

1,635,495

1,243,173

99,857

563,426

489,657

807,466

216,391

2,654,416

-

278,003

1,699,447

9,362

1,629,572

400,072

2,058,864

536,623

875,173

5,273,320

224,420

3,182,023

1,923,212

60,195

1,112,705

476,469

2,253

2,704,596

1,952,019

109,235

7,920,880

1,230,915

1,350,611

1,372,603

-

369,587

288,397

193,169

22,220

236,097

SAUDI ARABIA


Saudi Re For Cooperative ReiSolidarity Saudi Takaful Co

Amana Cooperative InsuranceAlabdullatif Industrial Inv

Saudi Printing & Packaging CSanad Cooperative Insurance

Saudi Paper Manufacturing CoAlinma Bank

Almarai CoFalcom Saudi Equity Etf

United International TranspoHsbc Amanah Saudi 20 Etf

Saudi International PetrocheFalcom Petrochemical Etf

Saudi United Cooperative InsBank Al-Jazira

Al Rajhi BankSamba Financial Group

United Electronics CoAllied Cooperative Insurance

Malath Cooperative & ReinsurAlinma Tokio Marine

Arabian Shield CooperativeSavola

Wafrah For Industry And DeveFitaihi Holding Group

Tourism Enterprise Co/ ShamsSahara Petrochemical Co

Herfy Food Services Co

5.54

6.79

6.79

16.60

19.15

15.23

13.27

13.02

62.31

22.20

34.85

20.70

12.35

17.30

8.05

12.25

53.00

20.15

24.53

12.32

13.09

18.18

20.97

39.45

22.68

14.53

35.22

7.84

67.87

2.21

1.49

3.35

1.84

-1.79

0.00

0.30

-0.61

0.67

0.00

1.06

0.00

0.40

0.00

1.90

1.55

0.75

-0.25

1.11

2.24

5.14

1.91

1.21

0.15

0.44

3.49

0.92

-1.26

0.84

590,206

1,725,957

1,806,526

1,811,282

2,196,012

-

1,567,798

54,686,218

102,538

297,484

139,555

-

1,132,098

-

842,552

6,456,323

2,004,278

1,223,014

1,000,961

1,429,357

4,184,666

4,201,641

541,755

508,510

1,124,661

935,828

1,293,151

3,268,866

104,250

SAUDI ARABIA


Securities Group CoSultan Center Food Products

Kuwait Foundry Co SakKuwait Financial Centre Sak

Ajial Real Estate EntmtGulf Glass Manuf Co -Kscc

Kuwait Finance & InvestmentNational Industries Co Ksc

Kuwait Real Estate Holding CSecurities House/The

Boubyan Petrochemicals CoAl Ahli Bank Of Kuwait

Ahli United Bank (Almutahed)National Bank Of Kuwait

Commercial Bank Of KuwaitKuwait International Bank

Gulf BankAl-Massaleh Real Estate Co

Al Arabiya Real Estate CoKuwait Remal Real Estate Co

Alkout Industrial Projects CA’ayan Real Estate Co Sak

Investors Holding Group Co.KAl-Mazaya Holding Co

Al-Madar Finance & Invt CoGulf Petroleum Investment

Mabanee Co SakcCity Group

Inovest Co BscKuwait Gypsum Manufacturing

Al-Deera Holding CoAlshamel International Hold

Mena Real Estate CoNational Slaughter House

Amar Finance & Leasing CoUnited Projects Group Kscc

National Consumer Holding CoAmwal International Investme

Jeeran HoldingsEquipment Holding Co K.S.C.C

Nafais HoldingSafwan Trading & Contracting

Arkan Al Kuwait Real EstateGfh Financial Group Bsc

Energy House Holding Co KscpKuwait Slaughter House Co

Kuwait Co For Process PlantAl Maidan Dental Clinic Co K

National Ranges CompanyAl-Themar Real International

Al-Ahleia Insurance Co SakpWethaq Takaful Insurance Co

Salbookh Trading Co KscpAqar Real Estate Investments

Hayat CommunicationsKuwait Packing Materials Mfg

Soor Fuel Marketing Co KscAlargan International RealBurgan Co For Well Drilling

Kuwait Resorts Co KsccOula Fuel Marketing Co

Palms Agro Production CoIkarus Petroleum Industries

Mubarrad Transport CoAl Mowasat Health Care Co

Shuaiba Industrial CoHits Telecom Holding

First Takaful Insurance CoKuwaiti Syrian Holding Co

National Cleaning CompanyEyas For High & Technical EdUnited Real Estate Company

AgilityKuwait & Middle East Fin Inv

Fujairah Cement IndustriesLivestock Transport & Tradng

International Resorts CoNational Industries Grp Hold

Marine Services Co KscWarba Insurance Co

Kuwait United Poultry CoFirst Dubai Real Estate Deve

Al Arabi Group Holding CoKuwait Hotels Sak

Mobile Telecommunications CoAl Safat Real Estate Co

Tamdeen Real Estate Co KscAl Mudon Intl Real Estate Co

Kuwait Cement Co KscSharjah Cement & Indus Devel

Kuwait Portland Cement CoEducational Holding Group

Bahrain Kuwait InsuranceAsiya Capital Investments Co

Kuwait Investment CoBurgan Bank

Kuwait Projects Co HoldingsAl Madina For Finance And In

Kuwait Insurance CoAl Masaken Intl Real Estate

Intl Financial AdvisorsFirst Investment Co Kscc

Al Mal Investment CompanyBayan Investment Co Kscc

Egypt Kuwait Holding Co SaeCoast Investment Development

Privatization Holding CompanKuwait Medical Services Co

Injazzat Real State CompanyKuwait Cable Vision Sak

Sanam Real Estate Co KsccIthmaar Bank Bsc

Aviation Lease And Finance CArzan Financial Group For Fi

Ajwan Gulf Real Estate CoKuwait Business Town Real Es

Future Kid Entertainment AndSpecialities Group Holding C

Abyaar Real Eastate DevelopmDar Al Thuraya Real Estate C

Al-Dar National Real EstateKgl Logistics Company Kscc

Combined Group ContractingZima Holding Co Ksc

Qurain Holding Co

82.00

62.00

210.00

85.00

138.00

470.00

31.00

230.00

21.00

33.00

450.00

345.00

435.00

720.00

510.00

192.00

204.00

59.00

28.50

30.00

0.00

63.00

20.00

106.00

0.00

43.00

860.00

460.00

50.00

0.00

25.00

460.00

20.00

64.00

63.00

600.00

0.00

19.00

64.00

51.00

136.00

300.00

89.00

52.00

32.00

204.00

210.00

0.00

17.50

80.00

455.00

30.00

65.00

75.00

41.00

340.00

112.00

188.00

116.00

93.00

110.00

102.00

82.00

59.00

210.00

420.00

27.50

52.00

32.50

36.50

385.00

90.00

425.00

28.00

74.00

120.00

24.00

114.00

114.00

104.00

190.00

38.00

60.00

210.00

350.00

36.00

570.00

29.00

365.00

84.00

1,060.00

200.00

0.00

37.00

89.00

335.00

550.00

30.00

310.00

66.00

25.50

44.00

33.00

31.50

126.00

33.00

47.50

0.00

83.00

26.50

39.50

33.00

188.00

31.50

23.50

38.50

110.00

88.00

25.00

0.00

20.00

56.00

790.00

88.00

0.00

0.00

-3.13

0.00

1.19

0.00

0.00

1.64

0.88

2.44

0.00

-1.10

0.00

-1.14

1.41

0.00

-1.03

0.00

0.00

1.79

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

1.18

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

1.59

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

3.23

-1.92

0.00

0.00

-5.32

7.22

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

-2.78

0.00

0.00

0.00

1.56

0.00

-2.38

0.00

0.00

5.62

0.00

0.00

-1.79

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

1.85

0.00

0.00

-1.35

0.00

-1.10

-1.16

0.00

1.37

-6.25

4.35

0.00

0.00

-3.70

1.06

0.00

1.69

0.00

0.00

-6.49

-1.72

5.45

0.00

0.00

1.92

-4.76

0.00

-3.90

2.30

1.52

0.00

1.69

0.00

-1.49

4.08

2.33

1.54

-1.56

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

-2.35

0.00

-5.95

4.76

-1.05

-3.08

-2.08

2.67

0.00

0.00

4.17

0.00

2.56

-1.75

0.00

-1.12

0.00

24,701

83,486

2,934

10,000

500

5,000

155,478

508

10

8,211,379

31,923

50,000

498,481

746,587

54,475

267,515

61,126

5,000

982,560

50,550

-

40,001

1,180,873

375,200

-

4,556,247

94,521

21,643

160,300

-

581,531

150

625,892

8,663

500

9,490

-

106,500

3,050

795,200

21,145

5,000

11,922

11,132,936

100,500

334

15

-

817,345

2,500

10,000

33,060

87,928

10,500

225,012

336

16,999

158,113

1

10,000

5,154

9,500

7,361

325,000

500

134,854

694,569

7,010

500,204

80,000

20

102,970

413,723

11,601

100,010

50,000

307,216

539,923

1,810

267

2,000

127,500

381,400

6,356

323,862

122,272

219,364

51,269

1,158

1,500

19,841

50

-

103,359

65,036

38,475

244,653

2,126,325

10,000

40,955

3,037,590

180,100

1,450,903

2,266,000

107,500

323,323

340,020

-

3,100

3,000

750

19,975,073

250

335,214

107,750

758,000

50

100

285,000

-

13,247,967

339,200

7,500

516,019

-

KUWAIT


Voltamp Energy SaogUnited Power/Energy Co- Pref

United Power Co SaogUnited Finance Co

Ubar Hotels & ResortsTakaful Oman

Taageer FinanceSweets Of OmanSohar Power Co

Sohar PoultrySmn Power Holding Saog

Shell Oman Marketing - PrefShell Oman Marketing

Sharqiyah Desalination Co SaSembcorp Salalah Power & Wat

Salalah Port ServicesSalalah Mills Co

Salalah Beach Resort SaogSahara Hospitality

Renaissance Services SaogRaysut Cement Co

Port Service CorporationPhoenix Power Co Saoc

Packaging Co LtdOoredoo

OminvestOman United Insurance Co

Oman Textile Holding Co SaogOman Telecommunications Co

Oman Refreshment CoOman Packaging

Oman Orix Leasing Co.Oman Oil Marketing Company

Oman National Engineering AnOman Investment & Finance

Oman Intl MarketingOman Hotels & Tourism CoOman Foods International

Oman Flour MillsOman Fisheries CoOman Fiber Optics

Oman Europe Foods IndustriesOman Education & Training In

Oman ChromiteOman Chlorine

Oman Ceramic ComOman Cement Co

Oman Cables IndustryOman Agricultural Dev

Oman & Emirates Inv(Om)50%Natl Aluminium Products

National SecuritiesNational Real Estate Develop

National PharmaceuticalNational Mineral Water

National Hospitality InstituNational Gas Co

National Finance CoNational Detergent Co Saog

National Biscuit IndustriesNational Bank Of Oman Saog

Muscat Thread Mills CoMuscat National Holding

Muscat Gases Company SaogMuscat Finance

Majan Glass CompanyMajan College

Hsbc Bank OmanHotels Management Co Interna

Gulf StoneGulf Plastic Industries Co

Gulf Mushroom CompanyGulf Investments Services

Gulf Invest. Serv. Pref-SharGulf International Chemicals

Gulf Hotels (Oman) Co LtdGlobal Fin Investment

Galfar Engineering&ContractGalfar Engineering -Prefer

Financial Services Co.Financial Corp/The

Dhofar UniversityDhofar Tourism

Dhofar PoultryDhofar Intl Development

Dhofar InsuranceDhofar Fisheries & Food Indu

Dhofar CattlefeedDhofar Beverages Co

Construction Materials IndComputer Stationery Inds

Bankmuscat SaogBank SoharBank Nizwa

Bank Dhofar Saog

0.43

1.00

3.43

0.13

0.13

0.10

0.13

1.34

0.35

0.21

0.74

1.05

1.95

4.60

2.50

0.65

1.45

1.38

2.50

0.14

1.00

0.13

0.14

0.48

0.70

0.46

0.24

0.37

1.55

2.25

0.29

0.13

1.95

0.21

0.20

0.52

0.24

0.00

0.44

0.06

5.26

1.00

0.16

3.64

0.51

0.45

0.43

1.51

1.75

0.10

0.22

0.17

5.00

0.11

0.06

2.05

0.31

0.13

0.64

3.75

0.27

0.13

1.86

0.83

0.13

0.20

0.52

0.10

1.25

0.11

0.39

0.39

0.10

0.12

0.30

10.50

0.12

0.06

0.39

0.17

0.11

1.49

0.49

0.18

0.39

0.21

1.28

0.22

0.26

0.03

0.26

0.44

0.16

0.07

0.27

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.79

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

-0.69

0.00

0.58

0.00

8.64

1.08

0.98

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

-0.99

0.00

0.00

0.00

2.33

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.37

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

-1.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

1.35

0.00

4.55

3.33

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

3.33

0.00

-1.78

-0.61

-1.41

0.00

-

-

-

295,000

-

-

-

2,400

-

-

-

-

-

-

-

-

-

-

-

751,759

118,700

-

96,157

-

151,214

3,341

4,161,605

1,000

110,974

-

-

-

-

-

267,810

-

-

-

7,406

341,999

-

-

-

-

-

-

-

842

-

-

-

-

-

-

-

-

-

-

-

-

200,000

-

-

-

110,000

-

-

50,000

-

358

-

-

7,000

-

168,998

-

535,711

3,413,466

-

-

-

-

-

-

-

-

-

-

-

263,990

-

1,011,238

71,278

482,600

-

OMAN


Areej Vegetable OilsAloula Co

Al-Omaniya Financial ServiceAl-Hassan Engineering Co

Al-Fajar Al-Alamia CoAl-Anwar Ceramic Tiles Co

Al Suwadi PowerAl Shurooq Inv Ser

Al Sharqiya Invest HoldingAl Maha Petroleum Products M

Al Maha Ceramics Co SaocAl Madina Takaful Co Saoc

Al Madina Investment CoAl Kamil Power Co

Al Jazerah Services -PfdAl Jazeera Steel Products Co

Al Jazeera ServicesAl Izz Islamic Bank

Al Buraimi HotelAl Batinah PowerAl Batinah Hotels

Al Batinah Dev & InvAl Anwar Holdings Saog

Ahli BankAcwa Power Barka Saog

Abrasives Manufacturing Co SA’saff a Foods Saog

0Man Oil Marketing Co-Pref#N/A Invalid Security#N/A Invalid Security#N/A Invalid Security#N/A Invalid Security#N/A Invalid Security#N/A Invalid Security#N/A Invalid Security

5.51

0.53

0.31

0.07

0.75

0.28

0.20

1.04

0.11

1.72

0.41

0.07

0.06

0.31

0.55

0.14

0.28

0.06

0.88

0.20

1.13

0.08

0.18

0.18

0.62

0.05

0.86

0.25

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.50

0.00

0.00

0.00

1.49

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

-1.39

0.00

-1.67

0.00

-1.95

0.00

0.00

0.55

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

-

-

-

5,000

-

-

6,384

-

21,000

-

445,158

19,601

115,000

-

-

125,700

-

349,073

-

36,330

-

-

373,763

148

-

-

-

-

-

-

-

-

-

-

-

OMAN


Waha Capital PjscUnited Insurance Company

United Arab Bank PjscUnion National Bank/Abu Dhab

Union Insurance CoUnion Cement Co

Umm Al Qaiwain Cement IndustSharjah Islamic Bank

Sharjah Insurance CompanySharjah Group

Sharjah Cement & Indus DevelRas Al-Khaimah National Insu

Ras Al Khaimah White CementRas Al Khaimah Ceramics

Ras Al Khaimah Cement Co PscRas Al Khaima Poultry

Rak PropertiesOoredoo Qsc

Oman & Emirates Inv(Emir)50%Nbad Oneshare Msci Uae Etf

National Takaful CompanyNational Marine Dredging Co

National Investor Co/TheNational Corp Tourism & Hote

National Bank Of Umm Al QaiwNational Bank Of Ras Al-Khai

National Bank Of FujairahNational Bank Of Abu Dhabi

Methaq Takaful InsuranceManazel Real Estate Pjsc

Invest BankIntl Fish Farming Co Pjsc

Insurance HouseGulf Pharmaceutical Industri

Gulf Medical ProjectsGulf Cement Co

Fujairah Cement IndustriesFujairah Building Industries

Foodco Holding PjscFirst Gulf BankFinance House

Eshraq Properties Co PjscEmirates Telecom Group Co

Emirates Insurance Co. (Psc)Emirates Driving Company

Dana GasCommercial Bank Internationa

Bank Of SharjahAxa Green Crescent Insurance

Arkan Building Materials CoAlkhaleej InvestmentAldar Properties Pjsc

Al Wathba National InsuranceAl Khazna Insurance Co

Al Fujairah National InsuranAl Dhafra Insurance Co. P.S.

Al Buhaira National InsurancAl Ain Ahlia Ins. Co.

Agthia Group PjscAbu Dhabi Ship Building Co

Abu Dhabi Natl Co For BuildiAbu Dhabi National Takaful C

Abu Dhabi National InsuranceAbu Dhabi National Hotels

Abu Dhabi National Energy CoAbu Dhabi Islamic Bank

2.06

2.00

4.30

3.48

1.21

1.10

0.90

1.40

3.85

1.50

1.00

4.10

1.16

3.35

0.84

1.99

0.57

73.00

1.38

6.26

1.08

4.51

0.63

3.81

3.30

5.50

4.79

8.15

0.69

0.57

1.71

7.70

0.81

2.40

2.25

0.96

1.25

1.71

4.05

12.25

1.93

0.63

16.35

6.72

6.25

0.49

2.24

1.35

1.24

0.87

2.22

2.49

4.50

0.28

300.00

4.40

2.43

60.00

7.04

3.00

0.41

5.30

2.07

2.50

0.41

3.53

2.49

0.00

0.00

-1.44

0.00

0.00

0.00

2.94

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

-1.47

6.33

0.00

3.51

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

4.88

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

-0.49

6.15

1.79

0.00

10.79

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

5.00

-0.31

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

3.85

7.83

-1.14

0.00

-1.20

0.00

-3.45

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.28

-0.99

-2.38

0.00

-10.00

0.00

-4.65

-0.84

975,445

-

-

3,117,185

-

-

-

1,200,396

-

-

-

-

5,335

119,669

438,050

-

18,713,180

-

-

-

-

2,450

-

-

-

22,275

-

291,265

24,335,626

28,323,288

-

1,001

-

2,000,000

-

-

-

-

-

1,040,620

-

100,826,786

1,253,850

-

-

25,110,239

-

216,459

1,000

139,648

-

4,914,863

2,472,500

155,000

-

-

-

-

2,906,283

15,700

100,000

-

22,000

-

534,411

316,386

UAE


Zain Bahrain BsccUnited Paper Industries Bsc

United Gulf Investment CorpUnited Gulf BankTrafco Group Bsc

Takaful International CoTaib Bank -$Us

Seef PropertiesSecurities & Investment Co

National Hotels CoNational Bank Of Bahrain Bsc

Nass Corp BscKhaleeji Commercial Bank

Ithmaar Bank BscInvestcorp Bank -$Us

Inovest Co BscGulf Monetary Group

Gulf Hotel Group B.S.CGlobal Investment House Kpsc

Gfh Financial Group BscEsterad Investment Co B.S.C.

Delmon Poultry CoBmmi Bsc

Bmb Investment BankBbk Bsc

Bankmuscat SaogBanader Hotels Co

Bahrain Tourism CoBahrain Telecom Co

Bahrain Ship Repair & EnginBahrain National Holding

Bahrain Kuwait InsuranceBahrain Islamic Bank

Bahrain Flour Mills CoBahrain Family Leisure Co

Bahrain Duty Free ComplexBahrain Commercial Facilitie

Bahrain Cinema CoBahrain Car Park Co

Arab Insurance Group(Bsc)-$Arab Banking Corp Bsc-$Us

Aluminium Bahrain BscAlbaraka Banking Group

Al-Salam BankAl-Ahlia Insurance Co

0.17

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.20

0.00

0.00

0.68

0.11

0.07

0.11

6.60

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.16

0.19

0.00

0.85

0.00

0.38

0.00

`

0.23

0.31

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.13

0.00

0.00

0.85

0.00

1.17

0.17

0.00

0.48

0.34

0.57

0.09

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

-1.45

-6.78

0.00

10.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

-8.33

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

-1.05

0.00

220,000

-

-

-

-

-

-

17,908

-

-

123,681

175,000

800,073

200,000

493,800

-

-

-

-

159,682

42,033

-

44,000

-

75,000

-

650,820

18,290

5,000

-

-

-

40,376

-

-

3,000

-

6,321

15,900

-

102,100

20,000

24,396

68,991

-

BAHRAIN


Boubyan Intl Industries HoldGulf Investment House Ksc

Boubyan Bank K.S.CAhli United Bank B.S.C

Osos Holding Group CoAl-Eid Food Ksc

Qurain Petrochemical IndustrAdvanced Technology Co

Ekttitab Holding Co SakKout Food Group Ksc

Real Estate Trade Centers CoAcico Industries Co Kscc

Kipco Asset Management CoNational Petroleum ServicesAlimtiaz Investment Co Kscc

Ras Al Khaimah White CementKuwait Reinsurance Co Ksc

Kuwait & Gulf Link TransportHuman Soft Holding Co Ksc

Automated Systems Co KsccMetal & Recycling Co

Gulf Franchising Holding CoAl-Enma’a Real Estate Co

National Mobile TelecommuniAl Bareeq Holding Co Kscc

Housing Finance Co SakAl Salam Group Holding Co

United Foodstuff IndustriesAl Aman Investment Company

Mashaer Holdings Co KscManazel Holding

Mushrif Trading & ContractinTijara And Real Estate Inves

Kuwait Building MaterialsJazeera Airways Co Ksc

Commercial Real Estate CoFuture Communications Co

National International CoTaameer Real Estate Invest C

Gulf Cement CoHeavy Engineering And Ship B

Refrigeration Industries & SNational Real Estate Co

Al Safat Energy Holding CompKuwait National Cinema CoDanah Alsafat Foodstuff Co

Independent Petroleum GroupKuwait Real Estate Co Ksc

Salhia Real Estate Co KscGulf Cable & Electrical IndAl Nawadi Holding Co Ksc

Kuwait Finance HouseGulf North Africa Holding Co

Hilal Cement CoOsoul Investment Kscc

Gulf Insurance Group KscKuwait Food Co (Americana)

Umm Al Qaiwain Cement IndustAayan Leasing & Investment

27.00

20.50

390.00

196.00

87.00

100.00

174.00

0.00

28.00

570.00

34.00

270.00

108.00

590.00

75.00

95.00

0.00

40.00

760.00

270.00

57.00

31.00

52.00

1,160.00

0.00

25.50

30.00

96.00

57.00

95.00

18.50

70.00

39.50

0.00

820.00

77.00

100.00

47.00

20.00

73.00

142.00

320.00

91.00

9.00

1,120.00

69.00

320.00

47.50

330.00

335.00

0.00

490.00

29.00

132.00

32.50

700.00

2,180.00

70.00

40.50

0.00

2.50

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

-5.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

-1.32

0.00

0.00

-2.44

-5.00

-8.47

0.00

0.00

0.00

9.43

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

-1.04

2.78

-1.41

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

2.04

4.44

-2.44

-1.35

0.00

0.00

0.00

5.88

0.00

-2.82

0.00

2.15

0.00

0.00

0.00

2.08

0.00

0.00

-1.52

-6.67

0.00

0.00

0.00

767,600

280,853

726,846

639,887

105,730

5,000

170,128

-

1,210,731

60,500

4,100

3,500

10

2,350

1,805,000

60,346

-

90,000

250

741

10

500

28,000

9,983

-

173,600

1,087,186

1

1,050,917

5,000

301,000

106,090

45

-

10,305

169,212

2,331,400

15,500

4,000

60,000

4,020

4,714

1,730,092

1,584,200

10,000

19,750

24,576

1,457,748

367,250

10,101

-

1,896,919

683,010

3,721

181,616

2,067

384,062

32,500

95,000

KUWAIT


10 Gulf TimesWednesday, March 9, 2016

BUSINESS

Apple IncMicrosoft Corp

Exxon Mobil CorpGeneral Electric Co

Johnson & JohnsonJpmorgan Chase & Co

Procter & Gamble Co/ThePfizer Inc

Wal-Mart Stores IncWalt Disney Co/The

Coca-Cola Co/TheVerizon Communications Inc

Visa Inc-Class A SharesHome Depot Inc

Chevron CorpIntel Corp

Merck & Co. Inc.Cisco Systems Inc

Intl Business Machines CorpNike Inc -Cl B

Unitedhealth Group IncMcdonald’s Corp

Boeing Co/The3M Co

United Technologies CorpGoldman Sachs Group Inc

American Express CoDu Pont (E.I.) De Nemours

Caterpillar IncTravelers Cos Inc/The

101.06

51.35

83.33

30.04

106.50

59.10

83.33

29.54

67.81

98.15

44.10

52.36

70.88

127.25

88.90

30.61

52.52

26.87

138.86

60.29

121.81

118.49

121.71

160.08

96.60

152.54

59.59

62.83

71.99

110.63

-0.80

0.62

-1.34

-0.83

-0.22

-1.40

0.28

-0.84

-0.13

-1.25

0.20

0.29

-1.48

0.86

-1.95

-1.08

-0.24

-0.99

-0.92

1.75

0.04

1.14

-0.97

-0.31

-0.33

-1.81

1.00

-2.91

-3.72

0.20

10,313,589

9,949,024

4,054,629

7,748,307

2,261,826

4,333,086

2,199,457

9,430,112

2,854,605

2,153,250

2,801,456

3,522,312

3,468,529

1,753,229

3,964,442

5,720,802

1,786,673

5,122,949

1,801,642

4,030,781

675,058

1,995,531

1,497,650

568,953

1,107,780

1,161,936

3,498,751

2,442,461

3,935,597

605,600

DJIA


Wpp PlcWorldpay Group Plc

Wolseley PlcWhitbread Plc

Vodafone Group PlcUnited Utilities Group Plc

Unilever PlcTui Ag-Di

Travis Perkins PlcTesco Plc

Taylor Wimpey PlcStandard Life Plc

Standard Chartered PlcSt James’s Place Plc

Sse PlcSports Direct International

Smiths Group PlcSmith & Nephew Plc

Sky PlcShire Plc

Severn Trent PlcSchroders Plc

Sainsbury (J) PlcSage Group Plc/The

Sabmiller PlcRsa Insurance Group Plc

Royal Mail PlcRoyal Dutch Shell Plc-B ShsRoyal Dutch Shell Plc-A Shs

Royal Bank Of Scotland GroupRolls-Royce Holdings Plc

Rio Tinto PlcRexam Plc

Relx PlcReckitt Benckiser Group Plc

Randgold Resources LtdPrudential Plc

Provident Financial PlcPersimmon Plc

Pearson PlcOld Mutual Plc

Next PlcNational Grid Plc

Mondi PlcMerlin Entertainment

Marks & Spencer Group PlcLondon Stock Exchange Group

Lloyds Banking Group PlcLegal & General Group PlcLand Securities Group Plc

Kingfisher PlcJohnson Matthey Plc

Itv PlcIntu Properties Plc

Intl Consolidated Airline-DiIntertek Group Plc

Intercontinental Hotels GrouInmarsat Plc

Imperial Brands PlcHsbc Holdings Plc

Hikma Pharmaceuticals PlcHargreaves Lansdown Plc

Hammerson PlcGlencore Plc

Glaxosmithkline PlcGkn Plc

Fresnillo PlcExperian Plc

Easyjet PlcDixons Carphone Plc

Direct Line Insurance GroupDiageo Plc

Dcc PlcCrh Plc

Compass Group PlcCoca-Cola Hbc Ag-Di

Centrica PlcCarnival Plc

Capita PlcBurberry Group Plc

Bunzl PlcBt Group Plc

British Land Co PlcBritish American Tobacco Plc

Bp PlcBhp Billiton Plc

Berkeley Group HoldingsBarratt Developments Plc

Barclays PlcBae Systems Plc

Babcock Intl Group PlcAviva Plc

Astrazeneca PlcAssociated British Foods Plc

Ashtead Group PlcArm Holdings Plc

Antofagasta PlcAnglo American Plc

Admiral Group PlcAberdeen Asset Mgmt Plc

3I Group Plc#N/A!

1,544.00

275.80

3,751.00

3,707.00

217.60

898.50

3,104.50

1,026.00

1,781.00

194.70

172.60

352.70

478.10

877.00

1,430.00

401.90

1,038.00

1,136.00

1,003.00

3,785.00

2,086.00

2,629.00

265.80

588.00

4,221.00

436.30

450.00

1,659.00

1,652.50

229.90

704.50

2,021.00

613.50

1,226.00

6,467.00

6,300.00

1,328.00

3,096.00

1,966.00

871.00

191.20

6,660.00

949.30

1,340.00

445.60

418.30

2,834.00

70.62

233.30

1,041.00

343.50

2,572.00

229.80

297.00

532.50

3,064.00

2,679.00

942.00

3,662.50

448.95

1,733.00

1,227.00

546.50

139.60

1,396.00

285.50

916.00

1,193.00

1,534.00

428.20

392.40

1,860.50

5,610.00

1,919.00

1,217.00

1,393.00

225.10

3,386.00

1,027.00

1,458.00

1,952.00

462.80

675.50

4,005.00

353.10

819.40

2,930.00

542.00

171.65

496.30

948.50

459.50

4,053.00

3,318.00

858.00

984.00

531.50

531.00

1,969.00

275.30

425.40

0.00

-0.26

-5.52

-2.37

-0.40

-0.32

-1.10

0.57

-0.39

-0.78

1.51

-1.88

-1.12

-0.76

-1.24

0.00

-0.30

-0.86

-0.18

-1.08

0.50

-0.10

-0.83

-1.74

-1.51

0.13

-0.75

-0.90

-1.10

-1.28

-0.17

-2.36

-9.66

-0.41

0.16

0.48

-1.79

0.11

-3.19

-1.40

0.46

-0.47

1.60

0.94

-0.89

-0.54

-1.23

-0.07

-2.93

-1.73

0.00

-0.38

-1.49

-1.75

-0.57

-1.39

-1.54

-0.19

1.51

0.05

-0.31

-2.64

-2.62

-0.36

-18.24

1.53

-1.79

-3.73

-0.75

0.07

-0.67

-0.76

0.08

-0.71

0.95

-0.25

-0.57

-0.22

-0.99

0.79

6.35

0.00

-0.62

0.22

-0.09

-3.41

-8.73

-3.24

-1.63

-1.18

-0.84

-0.16

-0.52

0.91

-0.75

-4.24

-2.19

-10.30

-15.46

0.25

-2.10

-2.70

0.00

3,108,646

11,395,526

436,520

472,494

25,483,252

886,533

1,332,117

319,782

663,958

30,732,415

7,635,005

2,029,575

13,231,053

807,917

2,168,766

1,651,228

676,119

1,085,016

1,322,244

1,379,162

237,105

270,701

3,108,434

1,142,424

1,514,445

778,125

1,640,431

4,819,025

6,242,573

13,433,086

4,019,270

7,276,510

1,102,859

1,770,859

598,764

359,167

3,926,747

244,602

693,504

2,229,042

8,034,987

263,314

5,091,027

1,237,820

572,099

2,447,840

466,446

94,057,116

9,937,698

1,438,827

2,298,500

462,585

7,745,783

936,948

10,094,781

325,080

573,287

1,268,453

1,566,913

18,779,724

354,253

303,573

1,358,238

104,848,117

5,614,699

2,115,113

1,003,792

1,331,277

810,673

855,398

3,408,584

2,357,411

60,032

1,934,124

1,881,152

120,550

8,276,987

345,513

923,011

4,703,631

223,757

9,769,605

3,464,869

1,586,589

25,875,047

16,604,444

753,323

2,219,771

26,605,539

3,906,966

455,027

4,952,108

1,979,988

230,028

1,374,333

3,609,004

2,793,622

13,678,367

874,198

5,878,762

1,242,128

-

FTSE 100


East Japan Railway CoItochu Corp

Fujifilm Holdings CorpYamato Holdings Co Ltd

Chubu Electric Power Co IncMitsubishi Estate Co Ltd

Mitsubishi Heavy IndustriesToshiba Corp

Shiseido Co LtdShionogi & Co Ltd

Tokyo Gas Co LtdTokyo Electron Ltd

Panasonic CorpFujitsu Ltd

Central Japan Railway CoT&D Holdings Inc

Toyota Motor CorpKddi Corp

Nitto Denko Corp

9,724.00

1,462.00

4,325.00

2,329.00

1,498.50

2,189.50

432.00

208.30

2,457.50

5,006.00

512.00

7,124.00

992.00

418.70

19,405.00

1,157.50

5,990.00

2,871.50

6,644.00

-1.38

-0.44

0.65

0.95

-3.42

1.20

-1.28

-7.01

-0.79

-2.64

-3.23

-0.89

-2.75

1.31

0.31

-0.17

-1.80

0.37

0.21

1,796,700

8,378,300

2,123,100

2,612,100

2,166,300

5,354,000

21,502,000

84,707,000

1,638,000

2,184,300

14,534,000

929,300

15,277,600

21,911,000

950,900

4,047,700

13,056,700

6,389,700

2,191,000

TOKYO


Rakuten IncKyocera Corp

Nissan Motor Co LtdHitachi Ltd

Takeda Pharmaceutical Co LtdJfe Holdings Inc

Ana Holdings IncMitsubishi Electric Corp

Sumitomo Mitsui Financial GrHonda Motor Co Ltd

Fast Retailing Co LtdMs&Ad Insurance Group Holdin

Kubota CorpSeven & I Holdings Co Ltd

Inpex CorpResona Holdings Inc

Asahi Kasei CorpKirin Holdings Co Ltd

Marubeni CorpMitsubishi Ufj Financial Gro

Mitsubishi Chemical HoldingsFanuc Corp

Daito Trust Construct Co LtdOtsuka Holdings Co Ltd

Oriental Land Co LtdSekisui House Ltd

Secom Co LtdTokio Marine Holdings Inc

Aeon Co LtdMitsui & Co Ltd

Kao CorpDai-Ichi Life Insurance

Mazda Motor CorpKomatsu Ltd

West Japan Railway CoMurata Manufacturing Co Ltd

Kansai Electric Power Co IncDenso Corp

Sompo Japan Nipponkoa HoldinDaiwa House Industry Co Ltd

Jx Holdings IncNippon Steel & Sumitomo Meta

Suzuki Motor CorpNippon Telegraph & Telephone

Ajinomoto Co IncMitsui Fudosan Co Ltd

Ono Pharmaceutical Co LtdDaikin Industries Ltd

Bank Of Yokohama Ltd/TheToray Industries IncAstellas Pharma Inc

Bridgestone CorpSony CorpHoya Corp

Sumitomo Mitsui Trust HoldinJapan Tobacco Inc

Osaka Gas Co LtdSumitomo Electric Industries

Daiwa Securities Group IncSoftbank Group Corp

Mizuho Financial Group IncNomura Holdings Inc

Daiichi Sankyo Co LtdFuji Heavy Industries Ltd

Ntt Docomo IncSumitomo Realty & Developmen

Sumitomo Metal Mining Co LtdOrix Corp

Asahi Group Holdings LtdKeyence Corp

Nidec CorpIsuzu Motors Ltd

Unicharm CorpShin-Etsu Chemical Co Ltd

Smc CorpMitsubishi CorpNintendo Co Ltd

Eisai Co LtdSumitomo Corp

Canon IncJapan Airlines Co Ltd

1,140.00

5,147.00

1,091.00

513.20

5,447.00

1,596.00

324.90

1,173.00

3,545.00

3,140.00

34,420.00

3,110.00

1,566.00

4,445.00

943.70

413.50

699.70

1,517.50

604.20

538.80

601.90

18,195.00

15,480.00

4,052.00

7,938.00

1,838.00

8,340.00

3,955.00

1,524.00

1,456.00

5,732.00

1,434.00

1,668.50

1,958.50

6,615.00

14,380.00

1,250.00

4,398.00

3,344.00

3,085.00

463.70

2,193.00

2,831.50

4,672.00

2,717.00

2,768.50

22,110.00

8,025.00

538.70

922.70

1,568.50

4,146.00

2,569.50

4,255.00

347.80

4,673.00

435.40

1,362.50

723.60

5,851.00

178.70

524.00

2,454.50

3,990.00

2,494.50

3,299.00

1,301.00

1,576.00

3,415.00

58,630.00

8,227.00

1,143.00

2,453.50

5,992.00

27,430.00

2,041.50

15,825.00

6,857.00

1,230.50

3,297.00

4,061.00

0.48

-1.30

-2.63

-0.87

-0.67

-0.25

-0.76

-2.17

-1.94

-0.95

-0.20

-1.05

-2.40

-0.91

-0.72

-3.14

-1.05

-0.69

-1.87

-2.60

-3.67

2.05

0.88

-1.89

0.15

-1.39

-2.34

-1.42

-0.03

0.41

1.27

-1.44

-2.11

2.11

-1.30

-1.84

-2.04

-2.91

-1.65

-1.50

-1.32

-0.02

-3.76

-0.89

-1.29

0.47

-1.58

-1.87

-2.87

1.13

-0.85

-1.19

-1.72

0.24

-2.85

1.06

-3.29

-4.25

-1.03

1.69

-1.27

-2.07

-1.45

-0.47

-1.85

0.98

-2.58

-0.03

-0.67

-2.22

0.35

-2.01

-1.88

-1.59

-0.65

-0.92

0.13

-2.89

-0.53

-0.99

-0.76

4,951,600

1,273,000

20,463,000

27,582,000

1,990,800

7,906,100

17,874,000

11,487,000

11,820,300

5,441,200

809,900

2,004,400

4,863,500

4,542,400

10,816,300

18,784,400

9,864,000

2,564,000

20,881,700

90,358,100

9,015,400

1,900,100

461,000

1,334,700

1,128,800

4,303,400

1,106,100

3,111,600

2,895,800

18,345,500

2,137,200

6,455,000

8,433,200

9,159,000

1,110,800

1,133,700

2,668,200

2,111,900

1,684,800

3,025,600

14,108,200

6,649,400

10,723,200

4,546,200

3,197,000

3,370,000

822,300

1,436,800

6,310,000

7,333,000

8,796,200

2,914,400

8,286,900

1,662,100

20,251,000

4,031,500

11,517,000

4,777,300

13,325,000

12,748,900

170,392,000

22,785,100

2,392,600

5,302,900

9,362,300

2,274,000

6,360,000

8,220,700

2,193,800

173,500

1,193,100

3,833,700

3,101,100

1,783,400

353,300

9,039,900

717,700

1,325,900

7,556,200

4,288,800

3,606,400

TOKYO


Aluminum Corp Of China Ltd-HBank Of East Asia Ltd

Bank Of China Ltd-HBank Of Communications Co-H

Belle International HoldingsBoc Hong Kong Holdings Ltd

Cathay Pacific AirwaysCk Hutchison Holdings Ltd

China Coal Energy Co-HChina Construction Bank-H

China Life Insurance Co-HChina Merchants Hldgs Intl

China Mobile LtdChina Overseas Land & Invest

China Petroleum & Chemical-HChina Resources Beer Holdin

China Resources Land LtdChina Resources Power Holdin

China Shenhua Energy Co-HChina Unicom Hong Kong Ltd

Citic LtdClp Holdings Ltd

Cnooc LtdCosco Pacific Ltd

Esprit Holdings LtdFih Mobile Ltd

Hang Lung Properties LtdHang Seng Bank Ltd

Henderson Land Development

2.86

26.65

3.10

4.76

5.48

21.30

13.38

97.10

3.21

4.81

17.80

22.20

84.80

24.80

4.87

14.90

19.98

13.84

12.58

9.09

11.84

69.35

9.26

8.86

7.16

2.94

14.72

130.40

44.35

1.06

0.19

-1.59

-1.65

2.24

-0.47

-1.04

-1.07

0.94

-1.23

-1.33

-1.33

0.18

-2.17

-1.02

-0.80

-3.48

-2.40

-2.18

-0.55

0.17

0.00

0.22

2.43

-1.10

-3.29

-1.08

-0.61

-1.44

31,310,573

1,832,858

217,646,121

28,564,021

22,425,441

5,047,923

2,245,422

2,707,860

18,010,971

174,163,256

59,873,221

2,827,829

11,457,250

24,600,000

127,532,856

10,532,441

9,617,066

4,246,190

14,524,855

26,384,663

8,151,086

2,388,945

91,073,348

9,816,849

2,671,547

4,540,007

3,354,716

1,258,369

2,383,988

HONG KONG


Hong Kong & China GasHong Kong Exchanges & Clear

Hsbc Holdings PlcHutchison Whampoa Ltd

Ind & Comm Bk Of China-HLi & Fung Ltd

Mtr CorpNew World Development

Petrochina Co Ltd-HPing An Insurance Group Co-H

Power Assets Holdings LtdSino Land Co

Sun Hung Kai PropertiesSwire Pacific Ltd - Cl ATencent Holdings Ltd

Wharf Holdings Ltd

13.88

172.20

49.25

0.00

4.11

4.64

36.00

7.18

5.36

34.90

76.25

11.60

93.70

78.85

146.30

43.30

-1.14

-0.52

-0.81

0.00

-0.48

-1.49

0.00

-0.42

-0.92

-1.97

0.66

-2.68

-0.95

-0.63

-0.14

-0.69

7,773,409

3,827,549

19,506,044

-

248,193,160

17,708,463

1,850,119

22,332,007

85,792,497

27,361,883

2,016,475

4,214,941

2,873,715

983,534

11,443,398

4,158,856

HONG KONG


Zee Entertainment EnterpriseYes Bank Ltd

Wipro LtdVedanta Ltd

Ultratech Cement LtdTech Mahindra Ltd

Tata Steel LtdTata Power Co Ltd

Tata Motors LtdTata Consultancy Svcs Ltd

Sun Pharmaceutical IndusState Bank Of India

Reliance Industries LtdPunjab National Bank

Power Grid Corp Of India LtdOil & Natural Gas Corp Ltd

Ntpc LtdMaruti Suzuki India Ltd

Mahindra & Mahindra LtdLupin Ltd

Larsen & Toubro LtdKotak Mahindra Bank Ltd

Itc LtdInfosys Ltd

Indusind Bank LtdIdea Cellular Ltd

Icici Bank LtdHousing Development Finance

Hindustan Unilever LtdHindalco Industries Ltd

Hero Motocorp LtdHdfc Bank Limited

Hcl Technologies LtdGrasim Industries Ltd

Gail India LtdDr. Reddy’s Laboratories

Coal India LtdCipla Ltd

Cairn India LtdBosch Ltd

Bharti Airtel LtdBharat Petroleum Corp Ltd

Bharat Heavy ElectricalsBank Of Baroda

Bajaj Auto LtdAxis Bank Ltd

Asian Paints LtdAmbuja Cements Ltd

Adani Ports And Special EconAcc Ltd

390.70

759.55

541.45

90.35

2,950.00

448.85

291.80

58.75

346.05

2,354.30

858.60

183.35

1,027.00

81.50

137.70

201.85

127.55

3,462.65

1,219.40

1,824.70

1,187.45

650.55

320.25

1,163.45

921.05

105.90

216.85

1,146.45

826.25

83.15

2,809.55

1,014.15

815.25

3,529.35

349.60

3,219.55

324.05

532.35

136.70

17,441.25

331.50

820.90

106.00

141.90

2,326.25

411.75

875.70

201.65

228.25

1,241.15

-1.38

0.07

0.84

3.38

1.48

-0.53

1.13

-0.84

0.74

-0.14

0.21

-2.68

2.05

-1.81

-0.69

0.57

1.19

-2.60

0.25

2.50

-0.48

-2.27

1.60

-0.62

0.56

0.24

-1.66

1.55

-2.65

4.72

-0.93

-0.63

-2.41

0.40

2.52

-1.02

-0.34

-0.99

6.67

1.06

0.68

0.70

-1.49

-4.70

0.87

-1.03

1.14

-0.37

1.38

0.15

1,360,325

4,672,871

1,630,770

32,314,372

376,732

2,157,860

10,548,387

5,046,420

8,598,067

666,297

2,438,326

30,992,518

3,446,908

10,160,664

11,484,250

8,904,202

3,761,569

1,173,682

821,529

11,249,650

2,227,873

708,825

9,036,560

3,935,579

2,083,309

8,643,696

18,352,219

3,645,780

2,263,313

21,153,200

747,608

515,330

3,357,724

61,646

1,122,887

331,670

15,902,938

1,546,966

8,071,711

15,843

3,048,346

1,572,883

10,362,477

16,683,036

222,756

7,750,863

1,293,114

3,606,201

3,284,970

159,946

SENSEX


WORLD INDICESIndices Lt Price Change

GCC INDICESIndices Lt Price Change

Dow Jones Indus. AvgS&P 500 Index

Nasdaq Composite IndexS&P/Tsx Composite Index

Mexico Bolsa IndexBrazil Bovespa Stock Idx

Ftse 100 IndexCac 40 Index

Dax IndexIbex 35 Tr

Nikkei 225Japan Topix

Hang Seng IndexAll Ordinaries Indx

Nzx All IndexBse Sensex 30 Index

Nse S&P Cnx Nifty IndexStraits Times Index

Karachi All Share IndexJakarta Composite Index

16,984.02

1,984.08

4,675.87

13,310.09

44,419.15

49,013.58

6,116.06

4,392.07

9,671.18

8,732.80

16,783.15

1,347.72

20,011.58

5,169.49

1,235.68

24,659.23

7,485.30

2,778.77

22,677.18

4,811.04

-89.93

-17.68

-32.39

-73.51

-548.01

-232.52

-66.34

-50.22

-107.75

-54.00

-128.17

-14.18

-148.14

-35.19

+5.30

+12.75

-0.05

-44.74

+49.14

-20.53

Doha Securities MarketSaudi Tadawul

Kuwait Stocks ExchangeBahrain Stock Exchage

Oman Stock MarketAbudhabi Stock MarketDubai Financial Market

10,418.23

6,430.87

5,284.68

1,163.13

5,363.22

4,585.10

3,386.23

+49.58

+43.43

+19.97

-9.21

-33.14

+18.71

+5.68

“Information contained herein is believed to be reliable and had been obtained from sources believed to be reliable. The accuracy and completeness cannot be guaranteed. This publication is for providing information only and is not intended as an off er or solicitation for a purchase or sale of any of the financial instruments mentioned. Gulf Times and Doha Bank or any of their employees shall not be held accountable and will not accept any losses or liabilities for actions based on this data.”

CURRENCIESDOLLAR QATAR RIYAL SAUDI RIYAL UAE DIRHAMS BAHRAINI

DINARKUWAITI

DINAR

Shares in Swiss resources giant Glencore tumbled 18.2% to 139.75 pence yesterday after an accident at its copper and cobalt mine in the Democratic Republic of Congo that left 2 people dead and five missing.

Europe shares hit 1-week low after weak China data Reuters/AFPLondon

European shares slipped to a one-week low yesterday, after poor trade data from China, the

world’s top metals consumer, put pres-sure on industrial metals prices and the mining sector.

China’s February trade perform-ance was far weaker than economists had expected, with exports tumbling the most in more than six years, days after Beijing sought to reassure inves-tors that the outlook for the world’s second-largest economy is solid.

The STOXX Europe 600 Basic Re-sources index fell 9.3%, the top sectoral decliner, dragged down by falls of 8.5% to 18.1% in the shares of BHP Billiton, Anglo American, Rio Tinto and Glen-core.

“Much weaker Chinese exports clearly point to additional trouble for the Chinese economy in the months ahead, with the global growth slow-down continuing to take a toll,” said Markus Huber, trader at City of Lon-don Markets.

“Furthermore, putting early pres-sure on stocks is the notion that any ECB action being taken on Thursday

is already priced in, leading to profi t-taking ahead of the ECB meeting.”

In London, shares in Swiss resources giant Glencore tumbled 18.2% to 139.75 pence as investors were also spooked by an accident at its copper and cobalt mine in the Democratic Republic of Congo that left 2 people dead and fi ve missing.

Anglo American saw its shares slump 15.5% to 530.9 pence, Rio Tinto dropped 9.4% to 2,026 pence and An-tofagasta was down 9.5% at 5,36.50 pence.

In Paris, the share price of steelmak-ing titan ArcelorMittal slumped 8% to €4.29, while Germany’s ThyssenKrupp slid 3.6% to €16.56 in Frankfurt.

German energy giant RWE saw its shares slide 4.4% to €10.79, after it posted falling annual profi ts and fore-cast fresh gloom for 2016.

According to a Reuters poll of traders published on Monday, the European Central Bank will expand the size of its monthly asset purchases on Thursday. Traders also expect another cut to the already negative deposit rate.

The pan-European FTSEurofi rst 300 index, which reached one-month highs on Friday after three straight weeks of gains, was down 0.9% to 1,329.36 points at the close, having

touched its lowest level in a week. Brent crude prices also fell, pressur-

ing the oil and gas sector, which ended down 2.5%.

Across Europe, Britain’s FTSE and France’s CAC both fell 0.9%, with Ger-many’s DAX down the same amount despite solid data.

German industrial output rose in January at its fastest pace in more than six years, showing that the en-gine room of Europe’s largest economy began 2016 well despite the fi nancial market turmoil that has hurt business sentiment.

Saipem shares fell 14.8% after two of the banks that guaranteed a recent stock issue at the Italian oil services group sold a 6% stake at a discount on Monday.

Shares in French supermarket retail-er Casino fell by 1.8% after criticism from US research fi rm Muddy Waters. Casino had no immediate comment.

Symrise fell 1.9% in heavy trade of nearly three times its 90-day average volume after the scents and fl avours maker posted weak fourth quarter re-sults.

However, Burberry rose 6.6% af-ter the Financial Times reported the luxury goods group was seeking help to fi ght off a takeover bid.

BUSINESS


ReutersTokyo

Japan’s economy contracted less than initially estimated in the fi -nal quarter of 2015 but private

consumption remained weak, under-scoring the challenges facing premier Shinzo Abe in restoring growth amid intensifying overseas headwinds.

While many analysts expect growth to have rebounded modestly in the cur-rent quarter, the bleak outlook for global demand has led some to predict another contraction that will push Japan back into technical recession – defi ned as two straight quarters of shrinking growth.

The weak economic backdrop will keep the Bank of Japan under pressure to further expand monetary stimulus, although central bank policymakers meeting for a rate review next week are wary of acting so soon after adopting negative interest rates late in January.

Sluggish growth could also heighten market speculation that Abe may delay a second consumption tax hike to 10% from 8% scheduled in April next year, some analysts say.

Japan’s economy, the world’s third-largest, shrank an annualised 1.1% in October-December, less than a prelim-inary estimate of a 1.4% contraction, Cabinet Offi ce data showed yesterday. That compared with a median market forecast for a revision to a 1.5% con-traction.

“Economic indicators in January are weak. The economy likely won’t re-bound signifi cantly in January-March,” said Yoshiki Shinke, chief economist at Dai-ichi Life Research Institute.

“The government may adopt some form of stimulus steps and may delay the sales tax hike if growth is weak in January-March and prospects emerge that it will stay stagnant in April-June.”

Growth in capital expenditure was revised up to a 1.5% increase from a preliminary 1.4% rise. Private con-sumption fell 0.9%, slightly more than a preliminary 0.8% decline estimated earlier. Taken together, domestic de-mand shaved 0.4 percentage point off growth, against a preliminary negative

contribution of 0.5 point. Economy Minister Nobuteru Ishihara said there was no change to the government’s view that Japan’s fundamentals were strong.

But separate data showed consumer confi dence fell for a second straight month in February to hit a one-year low, a sign Abe’s eff orts to lift the econ-

omy clear of decades of defl ation and stagnation are under threat.

The government has begun infor-mally discussing a delay to the sales tax hike, as Abe prepares for elections with household spending less than it was when he came to offi ce.

Analysts polled by Reuters before

yesterday’s data release expect Japan’s economy to expand an annualised 0.9% in January-March. But some among those polled predict a contraction in-cluding Deutsche Securities, which ex-pects the economy to shrink 1%.

The BoJ stunned markets in January by deploying negative interest rates to

prevent global market volatility from hurting already frail business sentiment. BoJ governor Haruhiko Kuroda said on Monday the central bank will scrutinise the eff ects of negative interest rates on the economy for the time being, sug-gesting that no immediate expansion of stimulus was forthcoming.

Japan economy shrinks 1.1%; consumer mood falls in Q4 Bloomberg

Hanoi

Silicon Valley venture capital fi rm 500 Startups is start-ing a $10mn fund dedicated

to Vietnam as the fi rm founded by Dave McClure backs more of the country’s technology startups.

Growing Internet use by its young population, where the number of mobile phones ex-ceeds the number of residents, provides an attractive bet in the nation that gave rise to the Flap-py Bird gaming phenomenon in 2014, said Binh Tran, a partner at 500 Startups. The fi rm has already backed e-commerce and messaging apps in the country through another fund focused on Southeast Asia.

Vietnam, home to 90mn peo-ple, is drawing interest from venture capitalists targeting companies that seek to capture consumers in the emerging mid-dle class, aided by an economy growing at more than 6% an-nually. With more than half the population online, the country’s technology talent makes it a particular draw.

“There are a lot of the main ingredients here that make it at-tractive,” said Tran, a co-founder of Klout Inc. “You have low-cost, high-tech talent, engineers and coders who are able to build and develop products as well as their counterparts in Silicon Valley who work at Google and Face-book, for a fraction of the cost.” E-commerce, language-learning and price comparison startups will be among the fi rst compa-nies to get seed funding and the fi rm plans to invest in as many as 150 companies, providing checks of as much as $250,000, he said.

500 Startups is entering a market where DFJ VinaCapi-tal has been the highest-profi le Silicon Valley venture capital-ist. The $30mn fund, established in 2007, is managed jointly by Draper Fisher Jurvetson, a Menlo Park, California-based fi rm, and VinaCapital Investment Manage-ment.

500 Startups starts fund in Vietnam

A shopper at a discount drug store in Tokyo. Private consumption in Japan fell 0.9%, slightly more than a preliminary 0.8% decline estimated, in the final quarter of 2015.

Goldman-backed ‘nimble gorilla’ targets distressed Indian assets BloombergMumbai

Indian billionaire Ajay Piramal is a man

on a shopping mission. His firms are

training their sights on distressed assets

discarded by indebted businesses and

banks struggling with bad loans.

His unlisted real estate unit, recently

flush with cash from Warburg Pincus & Co

and Goldman Sachs Group, is looking to

buy land parcels from distressed develop-

ers, a month after Piramal Enterprises

announced a $893mn fund to buy soured

loans. The group’s investment arm is

financing builders, who in turn can buy or

co-develop projects with their troubled

peers.

“My father says we should be like a

nimble gorilla so you are able to move

quickly, but at the same time you should

have the capital to move,” Anand Piramal,

the group’s executive director and scion

who manages the real estate business,

said in an interview in Mumbai. “It’s a

good time to be in the market.” Rich pick-

ings may come through for the Piramal

conglomerate as Indian developers’ cash

flow from operations fall short of their

finance costs and lenders, desperate to

recover dues, tighten screws demand-

ing repayment. Saddled with distressed

assets at a 14-year high, banks in Asia’s

third-largest economy have reported

record losses amid pressure from regula-

tors to clean up.

Piramal Realty will “look at good, prime

parcels of land with a clean title” from

distressed developers and is already in

talks for as many as five deals, Piramal

said. Disputes over land ownership are

common in India, with cases dragging

because of litigation for decades. Sellers

are becoming “more amenable now”

toward deals to overcome financial stress,

which may continue for another year at

least, Piramal said. “Capital is always a

source of competitive advantage.” Gold-

man Sachs acquired a minority stake in

the company for $150mn in August, about

a month after Warburg Pincus bought

into it, pumping in Rs18bn ($268mn). The

company has about 10mn square feet

under development in Mumbai and plans

to invest Rs160bn in the next four years.

Builders are selling assets as they

streamline operations driven by both

strategy and distress, according to Shobhit

Agarwal, managing director for capital

markets at property broker Jones Lang

LaSalle India. “Developers are turning to

these big boys because they have both the

money and the market trust to make sales

plus command a premium,” Agarwal said.

As smaller local builders struggle with

byzantine approvals processes, high

cost of financing, dwindling sales and

drying cash flows, private equity firms

are stepping in, lured by the prospect

of acquiring property at deep discounts

from down-and-out developers. KKR &

Co said last month that it will invest in

two Mumbai projects by Sunteck Realty.

The luxury developer last year said it

was seeking private equity funds to buy

distressed assets from rivals. Singapore

sovereign wealth fund GIC in December

invested Rs19.9bn in a joint-venture hous-

ing project in central Delhi with India’s

largest developer, DLF. Piramal Fund

Management, the family’s real-estate

funding vehicle, is distributing as much as

Rs150bn to about 10 developers that are

in a position to buy land or collaborate

with struggling competitors.

The listed Piramal Enterprises an-

nounced setting up a Rs60bn Piramal

India Resurgent Fund with the specific

mandate of acquiring soured loans, ac-

cording to a post-earnings presentation

in February. Piramal declined to share any

details about the new fund or the sectors

it’ll focus on.

Shares of Piramal Enterprises, which

sells medicines to financial services, have

risen 6.2% in the past year, compared

with a 15% decline in the S&P BSE Sensex

and the 6.4% drop in the 63-member S&P

BSE Heathcare index.

The total cash flow from operations

for six developers tracked by Moody’s

Investors Service, was at Rs3bn in the

year ended March 2015, dwindling from

Rs30bn in 2011, while total interest costs

rose to Rs36bn from Rs29bn over this

period, the data showed.

Lenders struggling to recover soured

loans have weighed on credit in the

country. Loans to commercial real estate

segment grew 5.9% to Rs1.7tn in 2015, less

than half of the 14.8% growth the year

earlier, data compiled by the Reserve

Bank of India show.

RBI governor Raghuram Rajan has set

banks a March 2017 deadline to tidy their

balance sheets while India’s top court

directed the RBI last month to share a list

of the country’s largest defaulters in the

past five years.

“The squeeze is also coming in

because of the banks,” Piramal said. “If

banks are able to push developers to

accept more reasonable valuations, then

groups like us can step in. I think it’s hap-

pening.”

China hits out at US restrictions on ZTE AFPBeijing

China yesterday criticised a move by Washington to slap restric-tions on one of the country’s

biggest telecommunications equipment companies, ZTE, for violating US trade sanctions on Iran.

The US Commerce Department said ZTE Corp and related companies set up a scheme to circumvent sanctions and “il-licitly export” controlled items to Iran, violating US laws.

ZTE, China’s second-biggest telecom equipment maker, must now apply for permission on exports from the US to the company, it said. Such limits could hamper ZTE’s ability to purchase tech-nology hardware and software in the US.

“China expresses strong dissatisfac-tion and fi rm opposition to this,” China’s ministry of commerce said in a state-ment, quoting an unnamed offi cial.

“The US move will severely aff ect the Chinese company’s normal business ac-tivities,” it said, but added the govern-ment hoped to negotiate over the issue.

Founded in 1985, ZTE off ers both tel-ecom equipment and services, with cus-tomers in more than 160 countries, ac-cording to the company.

On the sidelines of China’s annual

meeting of lawmakers, foreign minis-ter Wang Yi told reporters: “This is not the correct way to handle economic and trade disputes. It will hurt people with-out benefi tting oneself.”

The case dates back to 2012 when the US Department of Commerce fi rst began investigating the transfers of US technology to Iran, according to media reports.

The US government agency said on Monday that ZTE used a series of shell companies to illicitly re-export control-led items to sanctioned countries.

In a separate statement yesterday, ZTE said it hopes to resolve the matter.

“ZTE Corp is committed to abiding by international industry conventions and the laws and regulations of the countries it is present in,” it said.

The statement added ZTE “is com-mitted to seeking a plan to resolve the matter as soon as possible.”

Washington in January eased several restrictions on doing business with Iran, following an international agreement over the country’s nuclear programme.

But sanctions tied to accusations that Tehran supports terrorism remain in ef-fect, still largely blocking US companies from business with Iran.

Shares of ZTE were suspended for a second day on the Hong Kong and Shen-zhen stock exchanges, where they trade.

Washington urges Beijing to cut excess steel capacity

ReutersBeijing/Minneapolis

The Obama administration is

pushing China to reduce excess

steelmaking capacity that is

causing a glut of steel imports

into the US and other world

markets, the top US trade of-

ficial said on Monday.

US Trade Representative

Michael Froman told reporters

in Minneapolis that improving

conditions for the US steel

industry and Minnesota’s

beleaguered iron ore range

would require negotiations

with other countries to elimi-

nate subsidies for state-owned

steel enterprises as well as

vigilant trade enforcement

efforts.

“When it comes to steel,

there is a significant issue of

overcapacity around the world,

significantly in China where it’s

estimated to have more than

400mn metric tons of excess

capacity, and we’re pushing that

issue with the Chinese.

BUSINESS17Gulf Times


ReutersBeijing

China’s February trade perform-ance was far worse than econo-mists had expected, with exports

tumbling the most in over six years, days after top leaders sought to reassure in-vestors that the outlook for the world’s second-largest economy remains solid.

Exports fell 25.4% from a year earlier, twice as much as markets had feared as demand skidded in all of China’s major markets, while imports slumped 13.8%, the 16th straight month of decline.

The export drop was the biggest since May 2009, but economists said it may not necessarily point to a signifi cant worsening in economic conditions due to sharply reduced business activity during the long Lunar New Year holi-days, which fell in early February this year. Still, January-February exports on a combined basis, which should iron out some of the holiday eff ect, fell 17.8% and imports 16.7%, pointing to persist-ently weak demand at home and abroad that is weighing on the economy of the world’s largest trading nation.

“Exports were very strong last year in February because the Lunar New Year started so late and much of the usual disruption from the holiday was pushed into March. So the implication is that we’ll probably see a signifi cant reversal and a stronger number next month,” said Julian Evans-Prichard, China Economist at Capital Economics in Singapore.

“We suspect that overall exports re-main weak but we don’t see much evi-dence of marked deterioration, for in-stance there was no sudden drop-off in export orders in the Markit PMI (activi-ty survey), and they generally do a pret-ty good job of adjusting for seasonality.”

Analysts polled by Reuters had ex-pected February exports to fall by 12.5%, with imports seen down 10%.

China posted a trade surplus of $32.59bn for the month, down from $63.29bn in January, the General Ad-ministration of Customs said yesterday.

After missing trade goals repeatedly in recent years, China’s leaders did not give an estimate for trade growth in 2016 when they set out key economic targets in parliament on Saturday, re-fl ecting deep uncertainty about glo-bal demand. Commerce Minister Gao Hucheng said last month that he was confi dent that China’s trade conditions would stabilise and improve in 2016, though most analysts see no improve-ment in sight.

“The sharp drop in imports also shat-ters the hope that China is rolling out a stimulus package that would boost the demand for commodities,” said Zhou

Hao, senior emerging markets econo-mist at Commerzbank in Singapore.

“The recent rally in bulk commodi-ties, led by iron ore, might be only short-lived.”

Spot iron ore prices rocketed nearly 20% to the highest in more than eight months on Monday, buoyed by ex-pectations that Chinese steel mills are planning an output boost ahead of an expected crackdown on air pollution.

China’s iron ore imports rose 6.4% in January-February, though anti-dump-ing measures are squeezing steelmakers

who are trying to keep mills running by increasing sales overseas.

Goldman Sachs, however, said the iron ore rally would not last in the ab-sence of a signifi cant improvement in Chinese domestic steel demand, stick-ing to its bearish take on one of this year’s biggest commodity comebacks.

China’s leaders set an economic growth target of 6.5% to 7% for 2016 as they opened the annual session of par-liament last week, compared with 6.9% last year, the country’s slowest expan-sion in a quarter of a century. As part of

eff orts to stimulate activity, policymak-ers have proposed raising the 2016 fi scal defi cit to 3% of gross domestic product, from 2015’s budgeted 2.3%.

Economists also expect further re-ductions this year in interest rates and the amount of money that banks must hold in reserve, extending a year-long stimulus blitz. In late February, the cen-tral bank cut bank reserve ratio require-ments, releasing an estimated $100bn in cash for lending.

“Overall, today’s trade data, together with high-frequency data and leading

indicators, suggest that growth mo-mentum weakened further in January-February,” economists from Japanese bank Nomura said in a research note.

“We maintain our forecast of real GDP growth slowing to 5.8% in 2016 from 6.9% in 2015.”

Premier Li Keqiang acknowledged in parliament on Saturday that lead-ers face “a tough battle” to keep the economy growing by at least 6.5% over the next fi ve years, while pushing hard to create more jobs and restructuring state-owned enterprises.

China Feb exports postworst fall since May ’09

Flipkart markdown augurs lean times for India’s tech startups BloombergBengaluru

Cash-hungry Indian startups like Flipkart are dis-

covering the fundraising party’s winding down.

The domestic e-commerce leader became one

of the most prominent Asian startups to have its

valuation slashed by a high-profile investor. Send-

ing ripples through the industry, a Morgan Stanley

fund marked down its value by more than a quarter

to $11bn, less than a year after financing clinched a

$15bn valuation.

That’s an unexpected setback for Flipkart: it’s

currently seeking to raise about $1bn, according to

a person familiar with the matter who didn’t want

to be identified because the deal is private. India’s

top online retailer by sales is the largest of a crop

of startups craving capital to bankroll a battle with

Amazon.com and Snapdeal for a slice of the world’s

second-most populous country. It didn’t respond to

an e-mail requesting comment.

Beyond eight-year-old Flipkart, entrepreneurs

and venture capital investors are bracing for leaner

times and more down-to-earth valuations after

two years of frenzied deal-making. A deceleration

in funding could in turn quicken the failure rate

among smaller, ill-prepared startups.

“The global market is seeing several flat or down

rounds. There is no doubt that there will be more

discussions and pressure around valuation of In-

dian startups, given what Morgan Stanley recently

did,” said Ash Lilani, co-founder and managing

partner of venture firm Saama Capital, which has

backed startups including Snapdeal and Paytm

Mobile Solutions. It’s since exited Snapdeal.

“Only the strongest will survive. The weak –

those who do not have a solid business model but

still managed to raise money – will wither away,”

he said. “The companies with the right model, the

leaders in the pack will continue to raise money but

at realistic levels.” Smaller startups are already feel-

ing the heat as “investors sit on their hands,” said

Ravi Gururaj, founder and chief executive off icer

of digital locker startup QikPod, backed by Flipkart

among others. Companies that are burning cash

fast will have to tighten their belts and re-position.

“There is going to be a market detox. It is a healthy

sign.” Investment in Indian technology firms had

slowed from the peaks of 2015 even before the

filing in which the same Morgan Stanley fund

also marked down other prominent holdings like

lodging service Airbnb and Dropbox. Deals fell 46%

and venture capital investment slid 18% in the final

three months of 2015 from the previous quarter,

when Indian startups raised $1.5bn via 114 deals,

according to CB Insights and KPMG’s Venture Pulse

2015 report.

That mirrored a global slump. Venture invest-

ment in startups around the world dropped about

30% in the fourth quarter compared with the previ-

ous one, according to CB Insights. And there was an

increase in “down rounds,” when funds are raised

at a lower valuation than in previous financings.

During the last three months of the year, 26% of

mature startups raised money at lower valuations

than in earlier rounds, according to a study by law

firm Fenwick & West.

“Clearly, the euphoric times are over and we

are now moving into a consolidation phase,” said

Vishal Gondal, CEO and founder of Mumbai-based

GOQii, which makes wearable fitness bands with

personalised coaching. Gondal’s firm was one of

the few to get funding recently: $13.4mn from in-

vestors including China’s Cheetah Mobile. “It is now

about the survival of the fittest.” Indian startups

have enjoyed an unprecedented funding boom

over the past two years as global investors vied to

grab a piece of a rapidly growing economy with a

surging mobile population.

The country has overtaken the US in smart-

phone usage with about 220mn users, according to

Counterpoint Research.

Much of the mania has centered on an e-com-

merce market expected to grow an annual average

of 44% to $75bn by 2020 from $12bn currently, ac-

cording to Forrester Research. Flipkart has funding

from Tiger Global Management and Accel Partners,

among others, becoming in 2014 the only Indian

startup to have raised $1bn in a single round. Snap-

deal won over Japan’s SoftBank Group and Alibaba

Group Holding, while Paytm drew Alibaba.

‘Abenomics’ is losing support with economists, voters alike BloombergTokyo

Abenomics hasn’t had much impact reviving the fits-and-starts Japa-nese economy. That’s the verdict of

nearly two dozen economists canvassed in a new Bloomberg News survey.

Prime Minister Shinzo Abe’s signature domestic policy received an average score of 4.6 points out of 10 for overall economic effectiveness in a survey of 23 economists by Bloomberg from February 26 to March 4. The survey sounded out economists about the efficacy of Abe’s three-pronged pro-gramme – aggressive monetary policy, fis-cal stimulus and a regulatory overhaul – on Japanese growth, deflation and structural reforms on a scale of 1 (worst) to 10 (best).

The Bank of Japan’s monetary expan-sion and asset purchases have helped push the yen down to multi-year lows against the dollar and sparked a stock market rally from just before Abe took power in late 2012 through most of last year. However, the economy has performed unevenly, falling into recession in mid-2014 and then swing-ing between quarters of growth and con-traction last year. Data yesterday confirmed the economy shrank an annualised 1.1% in the final three months of 2015. HSBC Hold-ings economist Izumi Devalier warned it is probable that gross domestic product will shrink again in the period ending March 31.

Now, attention is increasingly shifting to whether Abe’s government will push through structural reforms that many economists believe are needed to produce sustainable growth.

More than half-way through his pro-jected term in office, which is expected to

end in 2018, time is running short for Abe to push through bolder plans such as job-market reforms and getting more women into management roles.

Foreign investors are turning their back on Abe, who proclaimed “Japan is back” and “buy my Abenomics!” at the New York Stock Exchange in September 2013. Among them is Alan Gayle, a senior strategist for Atlanta-based Ridgeworth Investments, which has about $42.5bn under manage-ment.

“The story in Japan is not unfolding the way a lot of people expected, so that’s going to put downward pressure on their markets going forward,” according to Gayle, who has been cutting back international exposure, including Japan. “The Japanese have been trying a lot of things, and they don’t seem to be gaining traction. Most of the com-ments that I’m hearing float around the no-tion that Japan really needs to look at struc-tural reforms as a way to unlock potential.”

The Topix index has slumped 12% this year as foreign investors, who account for about 70% of stock trading in Japan, have sold on a net basis for eight straight weeks. That’s in stark contrast to 2013, when overseas investors pumped a record ¥15tn ($132bn) into the market.

In the Bloomberg survey, the economists were more critical about the so-called third arrow of Abenomics focused on structural reform to pursue a growth strategy than about changing the atmosphere with rheto-ric and stimulus measures. They rated Abe-nomics at an average 4.1 and 4, respectively, for putting Japan’s economy on a sustain-able growth path and laying the future foundation with structural reforms, while the rating was 5.1 for ending the deflation-ary mindset.

A survey by the Nikkei newspaper and TV Tokyo between February 26-28 showed a half of respondents said they don’t approve of Abenomics, while 31% said they do. It was the first time that the rate of those who didn’t support Abenomics reached 50%, the newspaper said.

“The problem with Abenomics is it relies on monetary policy too much,” said Akio Makabe, an economics professor at Shinshu University in central Japan. “We’ve seen lit-tle progress made for fi scal rehabilitation and structural reforms like deregulation while stocks were up. I’m afraid that may hinder growth in the medium and long terms.” Gains have been made in consumer prices, which are no longer in outright decline, as they were before Abenomics. When the impact of food costs and the plunge in oil is stripped away, infl ation is about 0.7%. Until recently, the yen’s decline was also helping large compa-nies to record profi ts as their products be-came cheaper in global markets.

Even so, there is abundant evidence that Abenomics isn’t working as promised: Wages including bonuses and overtime pay, adjusted for inflation, fell in 2015 for a fourth consecutive year, according to the labour ministry. Private consumption fell for two years following a sales tax bump in April 2014, according to the cabinet office. Japan’s gross domestic product per person rose 2.8% from 2012 to 2015, according to the International Monetary Fund. That’s a step back from the previous three years, when Japan jumped 6.4%.

A plea for bold reforms is also coming from the Bank of Japan, which has done record monetary easing to buy time for structural reforms to boost growth. It’s still far away from reaching its 2% price goal, even after introducing negative rates.

Crude importdemand may slow after oil price rises above $40

ReutersSingapore

A rise in the price of global

benchmark Brent crude above

$40 a barrel could slow down

shipments to China in the second

quarter, after imports hit a record

in February, trade sources said

yesterday. Crude imports by

the world’s second-largest oil

consumer have been supported

by low prices that have driven

stockpiling, as well as buying by

a new group of Chinese refiners

who have received import quotas

over the past nine months.

February imports hit the high-

est ever on a daily basis, customs

data showed yesterday. But trade

sources said import momentum

has slowed after a $10 a barrel

gain in Brent crude futures in

the past three weeks, and new

buyers – smaller so-called “teapot

refiners” – may choose to draw

down inventories or carry out

maintenance at their plants.

“Such high outright prices will

impact demand,” said a source

from an independent refiner who

declined to be named due to

company policy. “China’s crude

inventories are very high so we

are likely to draw down stocks

first and keep a watch on prices.”

He added that demurrage

costs have also risen for ship-

ments to eastern Shandong

province where most of the new

buyers are located, because of

the recent high demand which

has strained port facilities. Such

costs could run up to $500,000

for supertankers or suezmaxes,

he said. “It takes 10-15 days to

unload at Qingdao and 7-8 days

at Rizhao,” he said. A source at

another Chinese refiner said the

spot discount over three months

has narrowed by about $1 a barrel

for May delivery crude from

three months ago, making spot

cargoes less attractive. “We’ve

finished buying for May and are

waiting to see if prices will fall

before looking at purchases for

June,” the buyer said, adding

that its refinery may undergo

maintenance unless China’s fuel

demand exceeds expectations.

Strong demand from the new

Chinese buyers for Russian ESPO

has pushed up the grade’s spot

premiums in recent months, but

premiums for April-loading spot

cargoes traded last week have

dropped about $1 from the previ-

ous month.

AFPFrankfurt

German prosecutors look-ing into the massive emis-sions-cheating scandal

at auto giant Volkswagen said yesterday that the number of suspects under investigation had increased from six to 17, but that no former or current board mem-bers are involved.

VW, which until recently had ambitions to become the world’s biggest carmaker, is battling to resolve its deepest-ever cri-sis sparked by revelations that it installed emissions-cheating software into 11mn diesel engines worldwide.

The software, known as a “de-feat device”, limits the output of toxic nitrogen oxides to US legal limits during emissions test by regulators.

But when the vehicles are in

actual use, the software allows them to spew poisonous gases at up to 40 times the permitted levels.

Nitrogen oxide is a pollutant associated with respiratory prob-lems and defeat devices are pro-

hibited in the US, where the VW scam was originally exposed, as well as in other countries.

On top of still unquantifi -able regulatory fi nes in a range of countries, VW is facing a slew of legal suits, notably in the US and

Germany, from angry car own-ers, as well as from shareholders seeking damages for the massive loss in the value of their shares since September.

In the wake of the announce-ment of a widening of the probe

yesterday, VW shares were among the biggest losers on the Frankfurt stock exchange, shedding 2.2% while the overall blue-chip DAX index was down 1.5%.

In VW’s home country of Germany, “the number of sus-pects in the investigation into the nitrogen oxide manipula-tion has increased from six to 17,” chief prosecutor Klaus Zie-he told AFP.

“There no former or current board members among the sus-pects,” added the prosecutor from the city of Brunswick, who had been tasked with the case as VW is based in the nearby town of Wolfsburg in Lower Saxony state.

VW has insisted from the very beginning that a small group of engineers was behind the scam. A number of managers have been suspended or sacked since the aff air came to light, including the

head of research and develop-ment at VW’s upmarket brand, Audi.

But in a copy of the defence document obtained by AFP, VW’s lawyers have sought to exonerate the group’s management in the aff air, including former chief ex-ecutive Martin Winterkorn and other board members, such as current supervisory board chief Hans Dieter Poetsch.

It conceded that discussions had been held and memos ex-changed at top management lev-el, but the issue was simply one of a number of others for board members.

Winterkorn, who resigned in the wake of the aff air, may have been warned as early as May 2014 of possible anomalies dogging its diesel engines, 16 months before the scandal erupted worldwide, the company admitted.

However, none of its top bosses could have known of the full ex-

tent of the scandal until it broke in September 2015, VW argued.

At a workers’ meeting in Wolfsburg yesterday, the group’s new chief executive Matthias Mueller rejected accusations of management attempts at a cover-up or foot-dragging in the probe.

The investigation to fi nd the culprits was “ruthless,” he in-sisted.

“The software manipulation and its consequences will be with us for a long time to come,” Mueller said. But “2016 will be the year during which we aim to solve to problem with our diesel engines for our customers,” the CEO continued.

“A number of questions can only be cleared up in the next years. These include the fi nancial consequences, which cannot yet be fully gauged as yet. But they will be substantial and painful,” Mueller said.

BUSINESS


German prosecutors widen net in VW emissions probe

Private consumption, investment help drive euro-area growth BloombergZurich

An increase in investment and higher

domestic spending helped propel the

euro-area to its 11th successive quarter of

growth even as net trade suff ered amid a

slowdown in China and other emerging

markets.

Gross fixed capital formation increased

1.3% in the three months through Decem-

ber, the European Union’s statistics off ice

in Luxembourg said yesterday. Consump-

tion in the private sector rose 0.2%, while

that of governments expanded 0.6%.

Exports rose 0.2%. Overall the economy

grew 0.3% in the fourth quarter, in line

with an initial February 12 estimate and

matching momentum in the previous

period.

The data comes the day before a hotly

anticipated gathering of European Central

Bank policy makers begins in Frankfurt. To-

morrow, off icials are expected to announce

still more stimulus in a bid to boost inflation

in the 19-country bloc and update their

economic forecasts. While ECB President

Mario Draghi said in January he expects the

economic recovery to proceed, risks to the

growth outlook remain to the downside.

Consumer confidence, an early gauge of

private consumption, worsened at the start

of the year.

In light of the stronger investment

figure, “you’d sort of hope this is the

beginning of a serious upswing, but given

what’s happened to confidence in the first

two months of the year, it very well might

slow down again,” said Aline Schuiling,

senior economist at ABN Amro Bank NV in

Amsterdam.

Concerns about the UK leaving the Eu-

ropean Union or Spain’s struggle to form

a new government show “the political

climate is not very stable now in the euro

zone,” she said. “For a positive investment

climate, you need a stable situation.”

According to a Bloomberg survey,

nearly three-quarters of the economists

expect the ECB to expand monthly bond

purchases tomorrow, and all but one see

the deposit rate being cut further below

zero.

The ECB’s review of stimulus comes

“against the background of increased

downside risks to the earlier outlook amid

heightened uncertainty about emerging

market economies’ growth prospects,

volatility in the financial and commodity

markets, and geopolitical risk,” Draghi

said in letter to a member of the European

Parliament published earlier this month.

While a drop in the price of oil and other

commodities has boosted real incomes in

the euro area, thereby facilitating private

consumption and shoring up growth,

countries as far flung as Saudi Arabia,

Russia and Canada are feeling the pain of

the raw materials slump. China’s economy

has suff ered a slowdown, which in turn has

hurt other emerging markets.

In a sign the pace of expansion is

slowing in the euro area, the purchas-

ing managers index for manufacturing

slipped in February, with the price gauge

dropping to the lowest in almost three

years. The fact that Germany, France and

Italy - the region’s three largest economies

— reported falling output prices is likely to

compound the concern among euro-area

off icials who are far from meeting their 2%

inflation goal. The Frankfurt-based central

bank sees growth of 1.7% this year, picking

up to 1.9% in 2017.

Yet German industrial production

jumped by the most in more than six

years at the start of the year, in a sign that

strong domestic demand may be helping

to underpin output in the region’s largest

economy even as external trade cools.

“The January industrial production

data imply upside risks to German and

eurozone GDP growth” in the first quarter,

London-based BNP Paribas economist

Dominic Bryant said in a note to clients.

Allianz to sue VW over Dieselgate share drop German insurer Allianz plans to sue Volkswagen in the coming weeks to seek compensation for a severe drop in the car maker’s share price stemming from the “Dieselgate” emissions scandal, a source familiar with the situation said yesterday. The planned lawsuit by Allianz Global Investors (AGI) represents the first such action by a major German institution against the national car making icon, which is still reeling from the biggest corporate scandal in its history. “It will happen within this month,” the person said. AGI said in a statement on Tuesday it had not filed an action against VW to date but was weighing a suit. “As asset manager it is our fiduciary

obligation to evaluate potential claims against capital market participants and, if necessary, follow through in the best interest of our investors,” it said. “A potential compensation would be for the benefit of the funds.” Volkswagen already faces a number of lawsuits resulting from the diesel emissions cheating scandal that aff ected about 11mn cars globally. Other German fund managers are also weighing legal action. California State Teachers’ Retirement System announced last week it planned to participate in a German suit against Volkswagen. Volkswagen declined to comment.

First BoE hike delayed until 2017, third push forward in two months Expectations for first hike pushed back to Q1 2017; median 45% chance bank rate rises from 0.5% by year-end; none of the 59 economists polled expect a move on March 17

ReutersLondon

The Bank of England won’t raise rates until early 2017, economists polled by

Reuters said, pushing back ex-pectations for the third time this year, which would mean eight years of record-low borrowing costs.

Many of the economists polled this week said all bets on where rates were headed would be off if Britain votes on June 23 to leave the European Union.

Since the start of the year, the median forecast in Reuters polls has moved three times. In a Jan. 4 poll economists thought the first hike would be in April-June but the lat-est survey said it would be the first quarter of next year before rates rise.

However, the latest change was a close call, with just under half the economists expecting a fourth quarter or earlier move and a little over half a delay until at least 2017.

“We have pushed back our main scenario for the fi rst rate rise to early 2017 due to evidence from recent PMI surveys and other data that slower global growth, and uncertainty relat-ing to the EU referendum, may be beginning to take the edge off the UK recovery,” said John Hawksworth at PwC.

Bank Rate has sat at a record low of 0.5% for seven years. None of the 59 economists polled expect any move when the Bank’s Monetary Policy Committee meets on March 17.

The poll found there is only a median 45% chance of a rate rise by the end of this year — down from 55% in a Jan. 26 poll — but a more convincing 75% likelihood of a shift by the end

of next year. Money markets, which can only really give a solid guide over a two-year horizon, are not pricing any hike for four years.

When the Bank does start to tighten policy, it will be in no hurry, the poll found. By the end of next year Bank Rate will be at 1.25% and then nudge up to end 2018 at 1.75%.

The BoE was once expected to be the fi rst major central bank to tighten policy but the US Federal Reserve took that crown when

it raised rates in December. But fears of another global economic slowdown have tempered ex-pectations for further tightening there.

Those worries, alongside non-existent infl ation, mean the European Central Bank as well as the People’s Bank of China are instead widely predicted to ease policy.

Also muddying the waters, Britons will vote on June 23 on whether to tear up their EU membership card. If they do,

the country’s economy would be worse off, nearly all foreign exchange strategists and econ-omists polled by Reuters said.

“The issue of when the UK raises rates depends to a large degree on (one) global events and (two) the outcome of the Brexit referendum. Therefore any attempt to predict when rates might rise is highly condi-tional upon events elsewhere,” said Peter Dixon at Commerz-bank.

Opinion polls have been close

but the “In” campaign has mostly been showing a slight lead.

Taking its fi rst concrete step to keep markets running smoothly, the BoE said on Monday it would off er extra funds to banks as the vote nears.

Governor Mark Carney said yesterday the BoE was not taking a view on the long-term impli-cations for Britain’s economy of a so-called Brexit but warned an “Out” win could hurt economic activity in the short term.

Jailed Libor trader denied Supreme Court appeal ReutersLondon

Tom Hayes, a former UBS and Citigroup trader serving an 11-

year jail sentence for conspir-ing to rig Libor global interest rates, was yesterday blocked from appealing to the UK’s Supreme Court against his conviction.

Hayes, the fi rst person tried by jury after a global inquiry into allegations of Libor-rig-ging, has redoubled eff orts to overturn his conviction since six former brokers he is alleged to have plotted with were found not guilty in a separate London trial.

London’s Court of Appeal yesterday formally refused leave for the case to be taken to the UK’s highest court, which hears appeals in exceptional cases of general public impor-tance, according to a spokes-man for the Serious Fraud Of-fi ce (SFO).

Since he was jailed last Au-gust, 36-year-old Hayes has succeeded in persuading the Court of Appeal to cut his ini-tial 14-year jail sentence — one of the longest on record for UK white collar crime — by three years. But he failed to overturn his conviction.

Hayes said in a statement from Lowdham Grange prison in central England that he was disappointed with the deci-sion, continued to maintain his innocence and would pursue all avenues available to him to clear his name.

“My application is clearly in relation to a point of law and is of public importance because it concerns the test of dishon-esty that applies to all crimi-nal cases in this country,” he said.

The former star derivatives trader was found unanimously guilty of eight charges of con-spiracy to defraud related to Libor, the London interbank off ered rate that banks use to set interest rates on $450tn of loans and fi nancial products worldwide.

He is now expected to take his case to the Criminal Cases Review Commission (CCRC), which looks at miscarriages of justice. However, one lawyer has said without exceptional

new evidence, it will be like “getting through the eye of a needle”.

In the meantime, the SFO is pursuing confi scation proceed-ings against Hayes to claw back around £3.8mn ($5.3mn) of al-leged proceeds of crime. Four days of hearings are scheduled to begin on March 12.

Prosecutors presented Hay-es, who was diagnosed with mild Asperger’s syndrome shortly before his trial began last May, as the ringleader of a dishonest scam to fi x Libor with brokers and other traders to benefi t his trading book be-tween 2006 and 2010.

Hayes denied dishonesty during his 47-day trial, say-ing he had been open about his practices, such as send-ing scores of messages cajol-ing, pressuring and off ering rewards to those who could infl uence rates. He said his bosses had condoned methods that were common practice at the time.

But his defence was compli-cated by previous admissions of dishonesty while initially co-operating with investigators in 2013. Hayes said during his trial that he later decided to fi ght the charges out of rage at being turned into a scapegoat.

Two former Rabobank trad-ers, Anthony Allen and An-thony Conti, are due to be sentenced tomorrow by a US judge after they were found guilty of fraud-related of-fences last November in the first US Libor trial.

Hayes: Disappointed.

BUSINESS19Gulf Times


Apple’s FBI clash risks piercing trust in EU privacy shield BloombergLuxembourg

Apple’s fi ght with the US gov-ernment over whether it can be forced to help unlock an iPhone

has spilled across borders, threatening to delay a trans-Atlantic pact protect-ing European data from American eyes.

National regulators from across the European Union promised to give their verdict next month on the so-called privacy shield deal, which toughens EU protections where the US is involved. The Apple case is raising concerns that the new plan doesn’t go far enough, re-gional politicians, offi cials and lawyers said. That in turn could mean more de-liberation and push back the comple-tion date.

Data-protection regulators will probably “be thinking about the FBI’s demands on Apple when reviewing the viability of the shield and its level of safeguards,” said Wim Nauwelaerts, a privacy lawyer at Hunton & Williams in Brussels.

Europe has traditionally had tighter protections for personal data than in the US, and revelations by Edward

Snowden showing the extent of Ameri-can security agencies’ snooping into communications overseas have exac-erbated tensions between the two re-gions. The EU was already struggling to garner support to ratify the shield when the fi ght between Apple and the FBI be-gan last month and raised awareness of how far law enforcement can go to get around people’s encryption and secu-rity devices.

Last month’s draft deal setting up the shield was designed to ensure European users’ data is safe from access in the US when companies ship it across the At-lantic for commercial reasons.

The EU heralded the agreement, saying that, for the fi rst time, the US gave it binding assurances that law en-forcement and national security would have strictly limited access to Europe-ans’ data. Among the proposed com-mitments was the creation of a special ombudsman in the US State Depart-ment who would follow up on com-plaints and inquiries by individuals about data access.

The EU and US were forced to the negotiating table after the EU’s highest court in October struck down a previ-ous 15-year-old pact, called safe har-

bour, for failing to off er suffi cient safe-guards against security services.

The EU court found “that the access that US authorities had to EU citizens’ data was too easy,” said Paul Bernal, a legal scholar at the University of East Anglia in England. If Apple loses the fi ght with the FBI and “authorities can eff ectively backdoor phones, that makes this access even easier.”

Viviane Reding, the EU’s former jus-tice commissioner, said a recent case involving American demands for access to Hotmail messages held on Microsoft Corp’s Irish servers shows that Europe-ans are right to be wary of the US.

Soon after the EU and US heralded a separate deal last September on data privacy in law enforcement coopera-tion, “the US Department of Justice argued in front of a US Federal court to bypass existing legal frameworks be-tween Europe and America,” she said. “That was the Microsoft case. This doublespeak is just terrible. Here we do have exactly the same problem with the Apple case.”

While the privacy shield gives Euro-peans stronger protections in some ar-eas, said Reding, who is now a member of the European Parliament, “when it

comes to the intelligence services, the text is the same as it was when I left of-fi ce in 2014.” On bulk data collection, she said new exemptions have been added.

The European Commission, which led negotiations with the US, insisted that the questions related to the Apple case aren’t comparable.

“The whole concept of the shield in relation to national security and law enforcement is to set out clear limita-tions and safeguards to what might be technically feasible for US authori-ties,” said Christian Wigand, a spokes-man for justice policy. “And we will of course hold the US accountable to these strong commitments made through a monitoring and review system put in place through the shield.”

Still, some regulators in the EU say the Apple case, and the issues at stake, makes it harder to rebuild lost confi -dence about data privacy.

“We are concerned about a global backlash in user trust, if companies can be forced to issue weak security versions of their products,” said Jacob Kohnstamm, head of the Dutch data protection authority, who sits on the panel of national offi cials known as the Article 29 Working Party.

While the Apple case has triggered a storm of controversy, the focus may quickly shift to EU nations, including the UK and France, which are also grappling with how to deploy technology to take on Islamist terrorists and hostile states without trampling on civil liberties.

The UK’s Investigatory Powers Bill — dubbed the “Snooper’s Charter” by its critics — will give the country’s spying services the power to look at browsing histories of suspected criminals once a senior government minister and a judge have signed a warrant.

A revised version of the bill will force Internet and phone companies to col-lect and store customer data and allow intelligence agencies to remotely access smartphones and other devices when permitted.

“There are major concerns remain-ing on bulk collection, mandating back doors and Internet collection records,” said Emily Taylor, an associate fellow in International Security at Chatham House in London. “It is also diffi cult to reconcile” with recent EU court rulings “and the direction of privacy shield.”

One of Britain’s top spy chiefs, Rob-ert Hannigan, weighed into the debate in a speech at the Massachusetts Insti-

tute of Technology on Monday, insist-ing he was neither “in favor of banning encryption” nor “asking for mandatory backdoors.”

Security agencies need a new rela-tionship with the tech sector, academia, society and government agencies, said Hannigan, director of Britain’s Govern-ment Communications Headquarters, or GCHQ. “We should be bridging the divide, sharing ideas and building a constructive dialog in a less highly-charged atmosphere.”

After helping prosecutors unlock at least 70 iPhones, Apple last year stopped cooperating and said the com-pany would no longer serve as the gov-ernment’s helper. Apple claims its US case could set a precedent and threaten other users by creating a program that will let the FBI get around the phone’s encryption.

Apple has already gained the back-ing of some of the industry’s biggest names, including Google parent Alpha-bet, Facebook and Microsoft Corp

Microsoft President Brad Smith said earlier this month that encryption is the most important technology to en-sure security and that “the path to hell starts at the back door.”

Apple ransomware attack casts lighton a boomingshadow industry

BloombergSan Francisco

The first widespread ransomware attack on Apple computers is drawing attention to a growing and lucrative corner of the hacking underworld where attackers encrypt and hold data hostage until they are paid to unlock the information.An estimated 6,500 Macs were infected with malicious software designed to make files inaccessible to owners of desktops and laptops, according to the Transmission Project, a file-sharing software provider. The decision to target Apple’s OS X software, which is both harder to hack and less widespread than Microsoft Corp’s Windows, underscores how attractive the practice has become, according to Cliff ord Neuman, who teaches cybersecurity at the University of Southern California.“We’ve seen a larger incidence of this ransomware, which is the new way that hackers are monetising their attacks,” Neuman said. “Most of it has targeted Windows machines in the past because it is the dominant architecture out there.”Researchers at Palo Alto Networks discovered the ransomware, which they dubbed KeRanger, on March 4. Once downloaded and installed, the bug demanded that users pay one bitcoin to decrypt the data, or about $411 at Friday’s prices. The researchers informed Apple, which revoked a certificate that allowed Macs to download the software, and Transmission updated its program to eliminate the infection, according to Ryan Olson, intelligence director at Palo Alto Networks.The number of known ransomware attacks doubled to more than 5mn by the third quarter of 2015 from a year earlier, according to Intel Corp’s McAfee security unit. One bug alone caused more than $325mn in damages last year, according to the Cyber Threat Alliance, a group of Web-security companies. The use of cryptocurrencies such as Bitcoin also makes it easier for attackers to conceal their identities, as opposed to asking victims to transfer funds to a traceable account.“The business model is working so well on Windows that, when they had an opportunity to do so on Mac, they did it,” Olson said. “It’s been eff ective to the tune of hundreds of millions of dollars a year.”The new attack targeting Macs follows Apple’s recent tussle with the US government, which is seeking help from the company to decrypt information on a terrorist’s iPhone. Apple is pushing back, saying that it needs to keep strengthening the security of its devices to protect customers even it means rebuff ing a criminal investigation.

Trump take note: US monetary policy increasingly made in China BloombergWashington

Here’s something else for Donald Trump to fulminate about. US monetary policy is increasingly

being made in China, not in the good old US of A.

That’s an exaggeration, of course, but it’s more than just misleading click bait. It’s indicative of a broader reality that Federal Reserve policy makers more and more recognise. No central bank — even the world’s most powerful — is an is-land. With increasingly interconnected global fi nancial markets, what happens overseas often quickly redounds on the US, and vice versa.

Here’s the reasoning behind the “Made in China” observation, as laid out by Joachim Fels, global economic advis-er for Pacifi c Investment Management

Co, which oversees $1.43tn in assets.First, hearken back to the middle of

last year when Fed Chair Janet Yellen and her colleagues seemed to have teed up an interest rate increase for Septem-ber. Then, bam, China engineered a tiny devaluation of its currency in Au-gust and fi nancial markets worldwide went into a tizzy.

The Fed, worried about the impact of the turmoil on the US economy, backed off , with Yellen telling reporters af-terwards that a lot of the focus at the September meeting was on the “risks around China.” The US central bank fi nally went ahead and raised rates in December after holding them near zero for seven years.

Fast forward to this year. Yellen and her team looked to have lined up a sec-ond rate hike for March after pencil-ling in four quarter percentage point increases for 2016. China then allowed

the yuan to fall in January. Markets again took fright.

Yellen subsequently singled out un-certainty about China’s intentions as she suggested in February the US central bank might delay raising rates. And now investors are betting that the Fed will stand pat at its March 15-16 meeting.

Fed policy makers say monetary pol-icy is data dependent. Yet it’s clear it’s also fi nancial-conditions dependent, according to Fels. So if developments in China disrupt markets and cause US conditions to tighten — whether it be through lower equity prices, higher corporate bond yields or a stronger dollar — Yellen & Co will take that into account in setting policy because of its potential impact on the economy.

“The Fed is watching fi nancial con-ditions very closely,” the Pimco adviser said. “And those conditions are infl u-enced very strongly by what’s going

on in the rest of the world and by what China is doing.”

China devalued its currency in Au-gust after watching the yuan rise in lock-step with the dollar as the US currency appreciated in anticipation of higher interest rates from the Fed. Beijing then untethered the yuan from the dollar in December, instead tying it to a basket of currencies. In spite of that move, it’s still very much exposed to shifts in US monetary policy and the impact that Fed actions can have on capital fl ows in and, more importantly, out of the country.

If this were just about China, it might not be all that big a deal for the US, as Fed Vice Chairman Stanley Fischer has observed. After all, US exports to the world’s second largest economy are less than 1% of gross domestic product.

But as the biggest consumer of a host of commodities, China’s economic

slowdown has an out-sized impact on the rest of the world — and one that In-ternational Monetary Fund Managing Director Christine Lagarde confessed last September had been larger than expected. It’s also one that Fed Gover-nor Lael Brainard said yesterday the US central bank needed to take account of in setting policy.

The dollar’s role as the world’s re-serve currency is adding to the strains. A stronger greenback is squeezing companies in China and other emerg-ing markets whose earnings are in their local currency and whose debts are in dollars. That’s no small beer. All told, emerging-market residents have bor-rowed some $3.3tn in the US currency, according to researchers at the Bank for International Settlements in Basel, Switzerland.

The greenback’s rise also has allowed oil producers such as Russia to keep

pumping crude — in spite of falling prices in dollar terms — because they’re still making good money in their local currencies. That in turn has implica-tions for the US stock market, where prices have recently been unusually af-fected by the ups and downs in oil.

At a rare joint conference with the New York Fed, People’s Bank of China Deputy Governor Chen Yulu warned on February 29 that a strengthening dollar could fuel a crisis in emerging markets. He said the central banks of the world’s top two economies should work more closely to counter a trend of weakening global economic policy co-ordination.

So what does that mean for the Fed? As recent experience shows, it’s going to be hard for Yellen and her colleagues to completely decouple US monetary policy from the rest of the world. Or, in the words of pop artist Neil Sedaka: “Breaking up is hard to do.”

Fed offi cials set battle lines on rate hikes ahead of March meet ReutersWashington

After a long wait for infla-tion to accelerate, US Fed-eral Reserve officials face a

complex and possibly divisive de-bate over whether recent evidence of rising prices is strong enough to move ahead with planned rate hikes.

In separate statements yesterday, policymakers at the core of that debate staked out starkly diff er-ent views, with Fed vice-chairman Stanley Fischer saying economic data now points to the “fi rst stir-rings” of infl ation, and Fed Gover-nor Lael Brainard countering that the Fed should not move until infl a-tion proves its “persistence.”

The diff ering views may not mat-ter immediately, when the Fed meets next week.

A rate hike at that meeting is not expected after weeks in which oil prices have remained depressed and global equity markets have been volatile.

But it could tax Fed Chair Janet Yellen’s ability to maintain consen-sus over the year as the Fed decides whether it is riskier to let infl ation rise more quickly now, and try to control it later, or raise rates more slowly in a weak world economic environment.

That discussion, largely moot over an extended period in which the Fed persistently missed its 2% infl ation target, may be joined in full after the central bank’s preferred measure of infl ation rose to 1.7% in January.

“We’re not that far away” from an infl ation target that has been elusive in an era of cheap oil, weak global demand and a strong US dollar that has held down the cost of imports, Fischer said.

Fed offi cials have argued since mid-2014 that those infl ation “headwinds” would pass, and re-cent data on prices of goods and services, as well as a jump in com-modity prices, may indicate that time has fi nally come.

“We may well at present be see-

ing the fi rst stirrings of an increase in the infl ation rate,” Fischer said, adding that an increase from too-low levels is “something that we would like to happen.”

Investors who had largely priced out a further Fed rate hike until late this year have pushed those expec-tations forward in recent days, as oil has rallied and prices of some other commodities crept higher.

It may take more than that to convince Fed members like Brain-ard. In recent weeks even policy-

makers who had been among the more concerned about infl ation joined her in worrying that public expectations about infl ation were falling, often a precursor to even weaker price increases and possible defl ation.

Brainard, the leading voice for the Fed to stay cautious in a world where China remains a risk and growth overall is slow, said one strong month is no reason to rush.

While January’s data was good, “it’s just that — a data point... For

me... I want to see a pattern, some persistence. That would give me some comfort,” she said.

“Given weak and decelerat-ing foreign demand, it is critical to carefully protect and preserve the progress we have made here at home through prudent adjustments to the policy path,” she told a group of bankers.

The Fed in December raised inter-est rates for the fi rst time in nearly a decade. At the time, it signalled it would likely raise rates four more

times this year, refl ecting a stronger US labour market and the view that infl ation will begin to rise toward the Fed’s 2% goal.

But an oil price slump, a global economic slowdown and volatile fi -nancial markets since the beginning of this year have convinced inves-tors that the Fed’s optimism may be misplaced.

Wall Street economists now ex-pect just two rates hikes this year, and traders of interest-rate futures are betting there will be just one.

Fed vice-chairman Stanley Fischer speaks at the Economic Club of New York (file). In separate statements yesterday, policymakers at the core of a debate staked out starkly diff erent views, with Fischer saying economic data now points to the “first stirrings” of inflation, and Fed governor Lael Brainard countering that the Fed should not move until inflation proves its “persistence.”

Qatar Airways will “cer-emoniously unveil” its redesigned exhibition

stand today, the fi rst day of ITB Berlin 2016, the world’s largest travel and tourism trade show.

“Visitors to the airline’s con-temporary stand will be ex-cited by the innovative tech-nology that Qatar Airways has employed to give them a unique experience, where they can interact with the airline’s ad-vanced aircraft and experience Qatar Airways’ signature Qatari hospitality with an invitation to enjoy its award-winning busi-ness class comfort and taste its exquisite menu,” the airline said in a statement.

Qatar Airways Group chief ex-ecutive Akbar al-Baker said, “I am looking forward to present-ing Qatar Airways’ new exhibi-tion stand to the world’s most notable gathering of travel and tourism professionals. Our new brand campaign, ‘Going Places Together’, celebrates our love of travel and our love of exploration.

“In that spirit of exploration,

our new stand will feature in-novative ways to interact with Qatar Airways, from our new Business Class seat with simu-lated views of the many places

you can visit on our fl eet, to the cutting-edge technology of our 3D A350. Of course, you can also depend on our team to walk you through the many award-win-

ning features of our airline. We take our role as a leader in the aviation industry seriously and have developed this concept for that very reason.”

Qatar Airways is one of the fi rst companies to combine holo-graphic 3D graphics with ‘swipe’ (or ‘gesture’) technology to give exhibition visitors a unique expe-rience, where they can move and play with the hologram of the air-line’s A350 aircraft — for which it was the global launch customer — and learn more about the ad-vanced aircraft, by simply mo-tioning in front of the screen.

In addition to integrating the new brand campaign and allow-ing visitors to try out the air-line’s business class seating and service, the new booth design also replicates particular ele-ments of Hamad International Airport, the hub of Qatar Air-ways in Doha.

Covering an area of over 40,000 square metres, the air-port off ers all the amenities ex-pected of a modern and luxuri-ous facility. Having opened in 2014, Doha’s state-of-the-art airport boasts more than 70 shops and boutiques, 30 din-ing establishments, a 25-metre pool, a gym, a hotel and a spa.

BUSINESSWednesday, March 9, 2016

GULF TIMES

Qatar Airways to unveil new stand at ITB Berlin

A view of the redesigned exhibition stand of Qatar Airways at ITB Berlin 2016.

Staff from Kahramaa’s Material Department answering questions from participants of the “1st Government Procurement and Contracting Conference and Exhibition (Moushtarayat).”

Mideast home to ‘highest proportion’ of millennial entrepreneurs globally: Report

Middle East is home to the “highest proportion of mil-lennial entrepreneurs” glo-

bally, a new report has shown. The research among more than 2,800

active business owners, worth between $250,000 and $20mn, fi nds that the Middle East also has the youngest aver-age age of entrepreneurship at just 26 years old, according to HSBC Private Bank.

On average, an entrepreneur in the Middle East, Mainland China, Hong Kong and Singapore employs 100 staff and generates revenues of more than $10mn. These fi gures are approxi-mately double the equivalent results for enterprises in the United States, the

United Kingdom, France and Germany. The journey to entrepreneurship

begins for 46% in the Middle East at school or college, which ranks the highest of any country or region. For 25%, their journey begins while in a professional career. As a region, the desire to set up business is strong, but many entrepreneurs seek some pro-fessional experience before going it alone.

Entrepreneurs in the Middle East, Mainland China, Hong Kong and Sin-gapore defi ne value creation not so much by personal fortune but by the size of the businesses that individuals have managed to create.

By contrast, in the United States, the

United Kingdom, Germany and France, personal wealth is a more important marker of entrepreneurial success.

There is a growing philanthropic impulse in the under-35s globally. In the Middle East, the younger genera-tion of business leaders is more likely to structure their giving than their older counterparts through a foundation or an estate plan.

They are also volunteering their ex-pertise to social causes more than the older generation, whose philanthropy was defi ned more by regular gifts to good causes. These subtle shifts be-tween generations and cultures are a reminder that value creation from en-trepreneurial activity is interwoven

into the economic and cultural fabric of society.

On the launch of the report, Sobhi Tabbara, Global Market head (Private Banking- Middle East) said, “Young people are one of the Middle East’s big-gest assets. Their entrepreneurial drive is reshaping and redefi ning the future of the Middle East’s economies. Their creative forward thinking is supported by governments intent on making it easy for small and medium business start-ups. This is a recipe for success. It’s therefore no surprise the Middle East is home to the highest propor-tion of millennial entrepreneurs glo-bally, with the average age for starting their business just 26 — the youngest

in the world. Now is a great time to be a millennial entrepreneur in the Middle East.”

Across the Middle East, Mainland China, Hong Kong and Singapore, 56% of entrepreneurs come from a busi-ness-owning background and these entrepreneurs are far more likely to join the family enterprise.

In the Middle East, around 63% of entrepreneurs come from a business-owning family; yet only 23% of mil-lennial entrepreneurs’ state they are shareholders or executives in the family business.

Instead, millennial entrepreneurs seek to prove their own business ideas and grow market share. With that said,

millennial entrepreneurs still hold true to the tradition of a ‘family business’ as more are likely to prioritise bringing family into their business, than leaving their business to be with family.

On family run businesses, Ahmed Abdelaal, regional head (Corporate Banking and Structured Finance) HSBC Middle East and North Africa, said: “Amongst businesses in the Mid-dle East, we see a real hybrid of young entrepreneurs involved either in the family business or breaking out to prove their own business concepts. As businesses are handed over or created through the generations, younger en-trepreneurs feel empowered to take a more collaborative approach.”

Kahramaa joins ‘1st Government Procurement and Contracting Conferenceand Exhibition’

The Qatar General Elec-tricity and Water Cor-poration (Kahramaa)

participated in the “1st Gov-ernment Procurement and Contracting Conference and Exhibition (Moushtarayat),” which will run at the Qatar National Convention Centre (QNCC) until March 10.

The three-day conference was organised by Qatar De-velopment Bank (QDB) to give owners of local small and me-dium-sized enterprises (SMEs) the opportunity to deal with major purchasers. It also opens the door for co-operation be-tween private and public sec-tors in Qatar.

Kahramaa is among the more-than 20 exhibitors par-ticipating in the event. “More than 400 contractual oppor-tunities at a total value of more than QR2bn” will be available to support, encourage, and en-able SMEs to bid in tenders at the in local market.

Kahramaa’s participation in the conference was repre-sented by staff from its Mate-rial Department, who will be in attendance to fi nd relevant companies and encourage them to take part in projects and ten-ders and provide them with all required information through various lectures and work-shops.

Commercial Bank joins ‘3rd Entrepreneurship inEconomic Development Forum’ as platinum sponsor Commercial Bank, Qatar’s first private bank, has

hailed the success of the “3rd Entrepreneurship

in Economic Development Forum” hosted by

Qatar University, where the bank participated as

platinum sponsor.

Commercial Bank CEO Abdulla Saleh al-Raisi

said: “Commercial Bank is proud to have sup-

ported this worthy forum through our participa-

tion and platinum sponsorship, as it focused

on developing two areas close to Commercial

Bank’s heart: the private sector and Qatari

youth.

“As Qatar’s first private bank with entrepre-

neurial beginnings, Commercial Bank strongly

advocates the diversification and growth of the

private sector by promoting entrepreneurship,

especially when this involves nurturing the

entrepreneurial skills of the Qatari youth.”

He added: “I congratulate Qatar University

for successfully hosting the forum and thank all

those who visited the Commercial Bank stand.” Commercial Bank off icials at the “3rd Entrepreneurship in Economic Development Forum.”

Ooredoo Mobile Money gets ‘Partner Innovation Award’Ooredoo’s Mobile Money (OMM) service has been awarded the “Partner Innovation Award 2015” for excellence in mobile money transfer services by MoneyGram.MoneyGram off ers the “Partner Innovation Award” every year to one of its partners who show a strong strategy, great execution, creativity and positive results within the area of the international money transfer industry.Ooredoo and MoneyGram have partnered since 2012 to enable customers to send money across the globe directly from their mobile.Since the launch of the partnership, Mobile Money has been growing multi-fold with thousands of users sending money home every month using the MoneyGram service.In 2015, Ooredoo Mobile Money saw unprecedented growth with the launch of new and innovative promotional off ers including QR1 fee

off er, free airtime and data off er, cashback off er etc, to reward customers for their international transfers.Customers can register for Mobile Money with a valid Qatar ID at any Ooredoo Shop, by dialling *140#, or by simply downloading the free “Ooredoo Money” app on their mobile and following the simple on-screen instructions.Mobile Money is available for use on any model of mobile phone and can be used to top up Hala accounts (with a 10% extra recharge), pay Ooredoo bills, send money locally to another mobile or QNB account, recharge Ooredoo data or buy Ooredoo Passport services or transfer money overseas.Users can deposit money into their mobile wallet using any of the over-200 Ooredoo self-service machines available across Qatar. Deposits can also be made through Ooredoo shops or direct transfer from any QNB account through QNB Mobile Payment service.

Role of academic programmes, state policies in entrepreneurship stressed

Public and private sec-tor leaders, as well as re-nowned academicians

from the region and beyond, have emphasised the need to create more relevant academic programmes and government policies that will continue to encourage the development of entrepreneurial skills and capa-bilities among aspiring business leaders in the region.

The call was made in the pres-entations and discussions con-ducted throughout the two-day “3rd Entrepreneurship in Eco-nomic Development Forum,” which concluded yesterday. The event was organised by Qatar University and Qatar Develop-ment Bank (QDB).

“The academic community aims to provide the necessary knowledge and skills required for the success of tomorrow’s business leaders,” said Dr Khalid Shams Abdelkader, associate dean of the College of Business and Economics at Qatar University.

“Through open lines of com-munication with the business community and government au-

thorities, we can eff ectively inte-grate the valuable lessons shared by successful entrepreneurs, as well as existing economic and business policies into our cur-riculum on entrepreneurship.

“At the same time, through academic research, the academic community can provide schol-arly inputs to the public sector in

the crafting of new policies that can further open up opportuni-ties for entrepreneurial activi-ties,” he said.

The second and fi nal day of the forum was highlighted by a pres-entation by Amro Ahmed, Qatar Local Content & SME manager of Qatar Shell, who explained the process of how SMEs can tender

to win business opportunities in Qatar Shell Supply Chain.

This was followed by a success story in a “Q&A format” with Talabat.com founder Mohamed Jaff ar, who revealed some secrets to his e-Commerce business, which was bought by German e-Commerce group, Rocket Inter-net, for $170mn in 2015.

Mohamed Jalahma, acting manager Export and Trade at QDB and Dr Maher Hakim, as-sociate professor of Entrepre-neurship at Carnegie Melon Uni-versity exchanged views on the theme “Financing Entrepreneurs & Entrepreneurial Venture.”

Nizar Darwish, manager of Investment at QDB and Ahmed Laiali, global ambassador of the International Business In-novation Association (IBIA), expounded on the role of an-gel investors and self-fi nanc-ing, partnership ventures, and crowdfunding.

Two keynote speeches from Ramzan al-Naimi, Creative and Branding consultant of Al Jazeera Network, and Munira al-Dosa-ri, founding partner of Girnass Games Application – Qatar also highlighted the event.

Dr Tarek Coury, senior econo-mist at Silatech; Bilal Randeree, managing director of Qatar Liv-ing; and Emad al-Khaja, CEO of Injaz Qatar; exchanged views on the theme “Building an Eff ective Entrepreneurship Ecosystem – Do we have what it takes?”

Experts taking part in a discussion during the “3rd Entrepreneurship in Economic Development Forum.”

SMEs to benefit from QR3bn procurement opportunities: QDB

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