Arun Panchariya-Equity funds lead the way for the year

Solid performance in UAE’s stock markets produced strong gains for regionally domiciled equity funds during the first seven months of the year. This also reflected positively on mixed assets funds that have heavy allocations to equities, according to data released by Lipper, a unit of Thomson Reuters that tracks mutual funds performance.

Majority of the region’s fixed income funds—as was the case with global onesc underperformed between January and July after they suffered in the months of May and June in the aftermath of the US Federal Reserve’s sudden announcement of monetary tightening to start later this year. Against the US Federal Reserve’s close to zero interest rate, regional money market funds have been among the best globally.

According to Detlef Glow, head of Lipper Research, Europe, Middle East and Africa(EMEA), in the global universe of equity funds, eight of the 10 best performing ones for the first six months of 2013 belong to the UAE Equity scheme.

Similarly, in the Mixed Assets category, eight of the 10 leading funds globally for the same period are domiciled within the GCC. In the universe of money market funds, seven of the 10 with the highest returns follow an Islamic approach and remarkably, all 10 funds with the best returns are GCC domiciled.

Leading the list in the equity category was MSCI UAE index tracker Invest AD’s fund, with a 63.01 per cent increase between January 1 and July 31, followed by Shuaa Capital’s Emirates Gateway Fund, which has exposure to UAE equities and rose 58.75 per cent.

Arun Panchariya- Witness the appliance of science at Abu Dhabi Expo

From biology and energy to chemistry and computers, the Expo-Sciences International forum will bring future scientists together in the capital next month.

The event is one of the UAE's largest focusing on scientific creativity and aspiring researchers.

About 1,500 participants from 60 countries, including the United States, France and Japan, are expected to attend.

Organised by the Abu Dhabi Centre for Technical and Vocational Education and Training, the forum will include more than 600 projects from young people between the ages of 12 and 25.

They will be classed in 13 categories, such as earth science, engineering, electric and mechanical technology, and mathematical science. Others will focus on medicine and health, physics and astronomy, and technology and biotechnology.

"Our objective is to really show the best of science projects, inventions and research that has been done from more than 1,550 participants," said Ali Al Marzouqi, president of Emirates Skills and a member of the organising committee.

Arun Panchariya-Vogue Café launches in Dubai

A coterie of top models and erm, Ivorian footballer Didier Drogba attended the launch of publishing house Conde Nast's new café in Dubai last night.

With images from the Vogue archives providing the prefect backdrop, models Karolina Kurkova, Bianca Balti and Petra Nemcova - fresh from their red carpet exertions at the Cannes Film Festival - were served canapés of miniature dishes, such as lobster rolls and shrimp spring rolls, all washed down with inventive mocktails.

The second Vogue Café (the first was opened in Moscow, Russia) is situated within the Level Shoe District in The Dubai Mall. The luxurious shopping destination is home to carefully curated selection of shoes by every big brand, from Berluti to Valentino.
Second from left: Petra Němcová, Karolína Kurková, Didier Drogba, Bianca Balti and Ariadne Artiles.
"The Middle East is a very exciting market for us and one that we are proud to be a part of," commented Stuart Nielsen, Condé Nast International's director of restaurants.
Nielsen added: "We will soon be announcing further expansion plans within the UAE, and along with our partners, Inspired Brands, expanding the Condé Nast Restaurants portfolio in the region."

A Tatler Club is already open in Moscow, a GQ bar opened in Istanbul in February.

Arun Panchariya-Dubai Registered Lamborghinis Seized In London

Two Lamborghini supercars with Dubai number plates have been seized in London this month after their owners failed to have them insured.

Last Wednesday a silver Lamborghini Aventador was swopped on by police as it parked outside Harrods, the luxury retail store owned by Qatar and popular with wealthy Arabs.

For the Metropolitan Police, who patrol England’s capital city, impounding high-performance vehicles from the Gulf has become a regular activity in recent years as the number of Middle East tourists has risen.

Earlier this summer the London constabulary even used a Lamborghini for promotional purposes to warn wealthy drivers of the risks of not insuring their vehicles.

A metallic purple Aventador with orange trim was placed outside the police’s headquarters, New Scotland Yard, after its driver did not have a licence or insurance.

With rocketing summer temperatures in the Gulf, escaping to Europe’s big cities with the promise of cooler temperatures and greener landscapes has become a popular retreat for many in the Middle East.

In London last year, Saudi visitors were up by 22 per cent year-on-year while visitors from the UAE were up 10 per cent.

With the rise of wealthy visitors though comes a rise in traffic offences, although London’s authorities often struggle to collect fines due.

In previous years a Dubai-registered Rolls Royce racked up 18 tickets for parking offences amounting to £2,000 (Dhs11,500) while a Lamborghini Murcielago, also from Dubai, was slapped with 24 tickets.

Arun Panchariya-Four Leadership Lessons From Dubai’s Ruling Family

As the emirate works hard on settling accumulated debt while simultaneously announcing new grandiose plans, Dubai is an economic wonder and a continuous source of excitement.

Be visionary

Dubai demonstrates that a vision can become almost self-fulfilling and make the near-impossible happen. The Al Maktoum’s visions for Dubai are a world apart from the vision and mission statements that are formulated half-heartedly by so many executive teams around the world, that are basically fluffy extrapolations of what their companies are more or less already doing.

The current ruler’s father and former emir, Sheikh Rashid bin Saeed al Maktoum, was naturally met with plenty of scepticism when he started transforming the small town of Dubai into an international hub for trade, transport and tourism. He laid the groundwork for today’s amazing infrastructure with foreign financing even before his emirate’s oil resources were discovered, which was relatively late and in moderate quantities.

Sheikh Rashid envisioned early on that Dubai’s oil wealth would be temporary and that the emirate would fall behind and back into past hardship, unless serious actions were taken. His philosophy, which his sons and other family members are applying to this very day, is that extensive supply can create impressive demand. Dubai has been built on visions, not on foreign experts’ estimates of immediate demand.

Communicate

In my work with executives in the Middle East and elsewhere, I often emphasise that what is not communicated does not exist for people around them. Clear, consistent and continuous communication has an immense power, and Dubai is an excellent example of this.

Within about 10 years, the emirate has gone from being a place few people have heard of to one that most informed people around the world have some perception of and where the international social elite visits regularly.

This road has been paved by small attention-grabbing events such as the tennis match between Andre Agassi and Roger Federer on the helipad of the Burj Al Arab hotel and the deployment by Dubai Police of a Ferrari and a Lamborghini as part of their fleet, as well as by other international iconic monuments like Palm Jumeirah and Burj Khalifa.

The art of communication is very close to the heart of today’s ruler, His Highness Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid al Maktoum. Not only is he a popular and respected poet and the author of the bestselling book My Vision, he also now has more than two million people following his daily reflections on life via Twitter. He is regularly present at formal events and often appears as if from nowhere to inspect his emirate personally and speak with its residents and visitors.

Nurture business acumen

No executive can claim any achievement by just following the classical textbook on leadership, as his or her actual results are what ultimately count. In this regard, it is striking that several of the Gulf’s most well run companies are closely associated with the Al Maktoum family. Among these are DP World, du, Dubal, Emirates Airlines, Emaar and Jumeirah Group.

Underneath Dubai’s extravagant surface lie several highly efficient economic engines. New businesses have been started and critical decisions made with a meticulously mercantile mindset. Customers should be satisfied and money should be made. Experienced management teams have been hired, given good degrees of freedom but required to generate profit from early on, and meet increasing expectations from their owners as they progress.

Dubai has had a sound business model for much of its ongoing commercial activities despite its debt issue, which became evident in late 2009. The emirate now has about $64 billion of debt maturing over the next three years. The situation was triggered by highly optimistic asset valuations combined with excessive availability of cheap loans and followed by the international credit crunch.

Places such as Hong Kong, Miami and Singapore, where demand and supply of real estate likewise have skyrocketed in certain periods, have had to deal with their own lows due to sudden large imbalances after enjoying times when almost everything was growing.

Arun panchariya-Abu Dhabi Doubles Development Fund Capital To Dhs16bn

The capital of the Abu Dhabi Fund for Development (ADFD) has been doubled to Dhs16 billion from Dhs8 billion, according to a new ruling issued by Abu Dhabi’s ruler Sheikh Khalifa bin Zayed Al Nahyan.

The increased capital will be fully subscribed by the Abu Dhabi government, reported official news agency WAM.

The new ruling amends some provisions of law no. (10) of 1999, concerning the establishment of ADFD, stated the report.

Under the new law, the activities of the fund have also been expanded to include the entire UAE, along with maintaining ADFD’s “fundamental role in achieving the state policy to promote the economic development in developing countries.”

ADFD, which is chaired by Sheikh Mansour Bin Zayed Al Nahyan, was established in 1971 as a vehicle to manage the UAE’s humanitarian affairs.

Total loans provided by the fund since its inception until the end of 2012 amounted to Dhs14.90 billion, covering 226 projects. The total value of grants provided by the Abu Dhabi government to projects managed by the fund reached Dhs13.46 billion.

Last year, ADFD also signed an MoU with the Asian Development Bank to increase cooperation between the two regions and develop a framework for co-financing development projects in Asia.

The fund owns stakes in 15 companies across 10 countries, and its total investments stood at Dhs954.04 million at the end of 2012. 

Arun Panchariya-Kuwaitis Head To The Polls For Sixth Time Since 2006

Kuwaitis voted for the sixth time in seven years on Saturday in a parliamentary election boycotted by the main Islamist and populist opposition, which may help liberals and independents win seats.

Turnout was expected to be low in summer temperatures hitting 44 degrees Celsius (111 Fahrenheit) during the Muslim fasting month of Ramadan, and as Kuwaitis become fed up with voting in short-lived parliaments.

The opposition boycott may produce a parliament more willing to cooperate with the government on economic development than some of its predecessors in a country where political infighting has held up investment.

“Voting is a national duty,” said Mohsen Dashti, a 40-year-old doctor who was casting his vote in a coastal district south of the capital. “We need reconciliation between the parliament and the government as well as a focus on development.”

The oil-producing U.S. ally has the most open political system in the Gulf Arab region. While it has witnessed sizeable street protests in the past two years over local issues, its generous welfare system and relative tolerance of dissent have helped to shield it from Arab Spring-style unrest.

But parliaments have been dissolved time and again, usually for getting too bold in challenging government ministers.

The snap election was triggered by a ruling from the top court in June, which said the process leading up to the last one in December was legally flawed.

Almost constant political upheaval and entrenched bureaucracy have held up major parts of a KD30 billion ($105-billion) development plan announced in 2010 to build a refinery, airport, hospitals, housing and highways.

Kuwaitis say they face housing shortages, clogged roads and an old-fashioned airport despite living in one of the world’s richest countries per capita. They point out that other Gulf states, such as Qatar and the United Arab Emirates, have pushed ahead with bold modernisation projects.

“It is very difficult and it is very depressing for us to have so many elections in such a short time,” said lecturer Wasmeyah al-Abbad after casting her ballot in an upmarket district close to Kuwait City.

Abbad, in her 50s, said the issues important to her were women’s rights, inequality and the dominance of powerful families in politics and the economy: “Men get houses, but women don’t, we don’t get to choose our careers, and some names are dominating positions.”

Campaign themes have included corruption, loan relief and concern over a $4 billion aid package to Egypt after the military overthrow of Islamist President Mohamed Mursi.

On Saturday Kuwaitis on Twitter vented frustration at the aid promise, saying the money could be better spent at home.

Kuwait and other Gulf states like Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates were glad to see the back of Mursi because they are fearful of Islamist influence in their own conservative, dynastically ruled countries.

“WASTE OF TIME”

Polls were open from 8 a.m. to 8 p.m. (0500-1700 GMT) and results are expected early on Sunday.

The mainly Islamist and populist opposition is boycotting in protest against a new voting system announced last October, which cut the number of votes per citizen to one from four, and which it says would prevent it forming a majority in parliament.

In a country where political parties are banned, the old system helped opposition politicians to form alliances by offering reciprocal backing from their supporters.

“The election will lead to a sham parliament that the government will control,” said Mohammad al-Dallal, a former Islamist MP who joined the boycott. He said many Kuwaitis believed the parliament would not last long and be invalidated by a court ruling or by the emir, like previous assemblies.

“Electing such parliaments is a waste of time,” he said.

The government says the voting changes brought Kuwait into line with other countries and will ensure stability.

Saturday’s vote will elect a 50-member assembly which can pass legislation and interrogate government ministers. But the 84-year-old emir, Sheikh Sabah al-Ahmad al-Sabah, has the final say in state matters and can dissolve parliament.

The emir courted groups unhappy about the new voting system and encouraged several powerful tribes to endorse the election. That led to splits in the opposition, with liberals deciding to run as well as Salafi Islamists, who support the austere form of Islam practised in Saudi Arabia.