Regional News

  Reuters Iran has deferred at least one of its fuel oil loadings for June to Asia, according to a trade source with direct knowledge of the matter. In a bid to recapture lost market share and bolster revenue, state-owned National Iranian Oil Co (NIOC) quickly ramped up exports of fuel oil once U.S. imposed economic sanctions were lifted in ...

  Bloomberg Iran plans to invite international companies to bid for oilfield development rights in June, a government official said, as the Persian Gulf country seeks to revive its energy industry after years of crippling sanctions. The Oil Ministry will solicit bids in a tender round starting June 21 and running for a month, state-run Islamic Republic News Agency reported ...

  Reuters Middle East fund managers have grown more cautious about building positions in both equities and fixed income, partly because of the risk of a U.S. interest rate hike as soon as June, a monthly Reuters poll showed. The poll of 14 leading fund managers, conducted over the last 10 days, shows 21 percent anticipate reducing allocations to Middle ...

  Bloomberg The World Bank’s International Finance Corp. will invest $25 million in Egypt’s Carbon Holdings, a petrochemical producer, as part of plans to commit $2 billion in the country. The IFC will look for more ways to provide financing for Carbon Holdings, Mouayed Makhlouf, IFC director for the Middle East and North Africa, said in an interview in Dubai. ...

AFP OPEC member Kuwait has earmarked 34.5 billion dinars ($115 billion) to spend on oil projects over the next five years, despite the slump in oil prices, a senior executive said. “We have earmarked 34.5 billion dinars for spending on oil projects over the next five years,” Wafa al-Zaabi, head of planning at Kuwait Petroleum Corp, told an oil conference. ...

  Dubai / Emirates Business A successful restructure of the Saudi Arabian Public Investment Fund (PIF) would represent a great opportunity for Saudi Arabia to have a positive impact not only the region, but also the world, says a London Business School strategy expert. The transformation of the PIF is a key aspect of Saudi Vision 2030. Ioannis Ioannou, Associate ...

  Bloomberg Borrowers and investors across the Middle East are adjusting to a new landscape following the region’s biggest-ever bond sale. Qatar sold $9 billion of Eurobonds in three maturities on Wednesday, almost double the amount expected by analysts. The issue helped push 2016 bond sales from the Middle East and North Africa, which includes Saudi Arabia and the United ...

  Bloomberg Saudi Aramco, the world’s largest oil exporter, is working with JPMorgan Chase & Co., HSBC Holdings Plc and Riyad Bank on the company’s first sale of Islamic bonds, people with knowledge of the matter said. The three banks will help the Saudi oil company set up a riyal-denominated sukuk program, with the first sale potentially taking place this ...

  Reuters A $16.5 billion mass transit project planned for Saudi Arabia’s holy city of Mecca has been delayed so that its financing can be restructured, the head of the implementing body said. The kingdom has been slowing infrastructure projects and paring back state spending as it grapples with the economic fall-out of two years of depressed oil prices, which ...

  Bloomberg Doha Bank QSC plans to expand its foreign operations to compensate for slower growth in Qatar, where a drop in oil prices is causing liquidity to dry up, according to Chief Executive Officer Raghavan Seetharaman. “We have scope for expansion,” he said in an interview at the bank’s headquarters in Doha last week. “It’s not like everything is ...