KUWAIT / Reuters State-owned refiner Kuwait National Petroleum Co (KNPC) has signed the first tranche of financing for its multi-billion-dollar Clean Fuels Project, a major plank of the country’s economic development plan. The tranche, provided by local banks and lasting for 10 years, is worth 1.2 billion dinars ($3.98 billion) and led by National Bank of Kuwait and Kuwait ...

  KHOBAR / Reuters The government-owned Public Investment Fund (PIF) replaced four of its representatives on the board of Ma’aden, the Gulf’s largest miner, in which it owns 49.99 percent. Saudi Arabia’s Mining Co (Ma’aden) said its board now includes the chairman of state oil giant Saudi Aramco, Khalid al-Falih and prominent Saudi businesswoman Lubna al-Olayan. Besides Falih and Olayan, ...

  DUBAI / Reuters Qatari telecom operator Ooredoo reported a 75 percent rise in first-quarter net profit driven by foreign exchange gains from Indonesia and Myanmar. The earnings of the former monopoly, which operates in about a dozen territories across the Middle East, Africa and Asia, have been volatile since mid-2013 when foreign exchange losses and plunging earnings from Iraq ...