Editorial Column

A stock market crash does not undermine excellent business fundamentals
The stock market crashes across the region are a reflection of markets driven to overvaluation by rampant speculation. The excellent business fundamentals of the region are still in place, but investors will probably now switch to other asset classes such as real estate, private equity, hedge funds, foreign equities, foreign exchange and gold.
United Arab Emirates: Thursday, March 16 - 2006 at 12:34 |

High-flying regional stock markets face a difficult period
Investors in Kuwait have demanded and got government intervention to support the local stock market. This may be the first of many such initiatives as the world's best-performing bourses of 2005 crash to earth in 2006.
Saudi Arabia: Thursday, March 09 - 2006 at 09:45 |

New poll shows Internet the media of today, not the future
The latest Gulf News, YouGov poll must make sobering reading for the owners of traditional media in the UAE. For the country's 1,384,800 Internet users are seriously addicted to the new media with news and information gathering their main activity after email. This far exceeds what media analysts previously believed.
United Arab Emirates: Thursday, March 02 - 2006 at 09:11 |

Stock market crashes and real economic growth
Both the UAE and Qatar stock markets have crashed in the past few months, and Kuwait and Saudi Arabia may have peaked. Yet oil revenues will probably be at a new record high this year. So how are regional stock markets linked to the real economy and does this matter?
United Arab Emirates: Saturday, February 25 - 2006 at 09:26 |

DGCX set to ride high on booming gold market
The Dubai Gold and Commodities Exchange is now trading more than 1,000 contracts a day after just three months of operation. This reflects the lively interest in gold as an investment class, surging gold prices and Dubai's ambition to be a centre of the world gold trade.
United Arab Emirates: Saturday, February 18 - 2006 at 12:11 |

Floating on a sea of liquidity in the Oil States
So who were the biggest savers of 2005? The thrifty Chinese? The spending averse Japanese? Or the low-growth Germans? In fact, none of the above. The world's biggest saver was the Oil States of the Middle East.
United Arab Emirates: Thursday, February 09 - 2006 at 10:46 |

Was 2005 the peak of the business cycle?
Stock markets generally try to anticipate the future. So is the recent weakness of bourses in the UAE and Qatar something more than the booking of profits by investors? Is there some reason to think that the business cycle peaked in 2005, and that corporate profits from here onwards will be more difficult to achieve?
United Arab Emirates: Saturday, February 04 - 2006 at 12:16 |

Is Middle East business right to be so optimistic?
A survey by PriceWaterhouseCoopers and Dubai based Moutamarat of 140 senior executives in 14 countries showed 83% expecting business to improve further in the next year. Is this extraordinary optimism about the future of business in the Middle East justified?
Saturday, January 28 - 2006 at 08:33 |