Regional News

  Reuters Egypt’s Supreme Investment Council approved a host of measures to boost investment that included an extended suspension of capital gains tax on shares and tax exemptions for producers in strategic sectors. Egypt has been trying to attract investment to restore growth since an uprising in 2011, which ushered in protracted political turmoil and scared away tourists and foreign ...

  Doha / AFP Qatar’s population has passed the 2.6 million mark as the emirate draws in thousands of workers to build the infrastructure for the 2022 football World Cup, official figures showed Wednesday. The tiny Gulf state has seen a more than four-fold increase in its population since 2000 as oil and gas revenues have fuelled a rapid economic ...

  Reuters Iran’s carpet makers are distancing themselves from their government in promoting their handmade work as they seek to regain valuable US sales and protect jobs following the removal of economic sanctions. “Iranian carpets are produced by female and male weavers who are managed by the private sector, so the government does not have a big influence,” Hamid Kargar, ...

  Bloomberg Egypt delayed the introduction of a capital gains tax on equities for three more years, as it tries to attract investors to help ease a hard currency crunch that’s hurting growth. Stocks rose. The postponement was included in a group of tax exemptions decreed by the Supreme Investment Council, the Presidency said in an e-mailed statement late on ...

  AFP Qatar said it expects “100 percent compliance” from businesses by the end of 2016 on a labour reform introduced to ensure the country’s vast migrant workforce receive their salaries on time. Government figures released in Doha on Wednesday to mark the one-year anniversary of the introduction of the Wage Protection System (WPS) show that 1.8 million — around ...

Reuters Egypt’s Suez Canal Authority expects revenue to increase to $5.7 billion this year after the waterway was widened, company executive Tamer Hammad said at a maritime conference in Dubai. The figure would be an improvement on the $5.175 billion achieved in 2015 and would continue an increase in revenues seen this year despite slowing global trade and initially sluggish ...

  AFP The Saudi energy minister said on Tuesday that a multi-billion-dollar technology investment fund the kingdom is developing in partnership with Japan’s SoftBank showed its determination to diversify its economy. Khaled al-Falih told an international forum that the proposed new fund “is simply one indication of this determination and the bold steps being taken” to reorient the economy of ...

  Bloomberg Egypt’s new wheat inspection program was met by relief from traders, who said the system will likely be easier to navigate and may lead to lower prices. The General Organization for Export and Import Control, or GOEIC, will be the sole state body responsible for wheat inspections at shipping and arrival ports, replacing government inspectors. The new system ...

  Reuters Saudi Arabia’s capital markets regulator approved rules for exchange-listed real estate funds on Sunday, as part of efforts to ramp up investment in the kingdom’s housing market. The kingdom requires private money to help finance construction of around 1.5 million homes planned over the next seven or eight years. In a bid to ease a shortage of affordable ...

  TEL AVIV / Reuters Egypt cancelled its three and nine month treasury bill auction on Sunday, data from the central bank showed, confounding market expectations of a steep hike in benchmark interest rates. Neither the bank nor the Finance Ministry gave any reason for the cancellation but bankers said banks had asked for yields the government found too high. ...