Saudi Arabia is working to finalise the rules for a new stock market dedicated to small and medium-sized businesses that it expects to launch early in 2017, the chief executive of Tadawul, the kingdom’s bourse, said on Tuesday.
Tadawul announced last month that it planned to open the new exchange next year in a bid to improve access to capital and encourage better corporate governance.
Saudi Arabia’s economy is dominated by family businesses, many of whom have been reluctant to go public in the past, preferring to keep control limited to a small group of relatives.
“The final fine-tuning of these criteria are being worked out today with related parties,” Khalid Al Hussan said on the sidelines of a finance event.
The government has not said if the new exchange will include companies already traded on the existing bourse. Small-cap firms are among the most heavily traded on the Saudi exchange as they are targeted by retail investors aiming to make a quick profit.
Chairman of the Saudi Capital Market Authority, Mohammed Al Jadaan, told the same conference that there would be certain restrictions in place to ensure only investors who understood the risks could buy into the SME market. He did not give more details.
While international institutions have been allowed to invest in Saudi Arabia since the middle of last year, trading on the kingdom’s stock market is still dominated by local retail investors.
Mr Jadaan said the new SME exchange would likely have a lower minimum capital requirement for companies than Tadawul, adding it could be in “single digits” as opposed to Tadawul’s 100 million riyals ($27 million) baseline.
Reduced disclosure requirements would also likely be part of the SME market, Mr Jadaan added.
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Mercer, the investment consulting arm of US services company Marsh & McLennan, expects its wealth division to at least double its assets under management (AUM) in the Middle East as wealth in the region continues to grow despite economic headwinds, a company official said.
Mercer Wealth, which globally has $160 billion in AUM, plans to boost its AUM in the region to $2-$3bn in the next 2-3 years from the present $1bn, said Yasir AbuShaban, a Dubai-based principal with Mercer Wealth.
“Within the next two to three years, we are looking at reaching $2 to $3 billion as a conservative estimate and we do see an opportunity to do so,” said Mr AbuShaban.
Mercer does not directly make investments, but allocates clients’ money they have discretion to, to professional asset managers. They also provide advice to clients.
“We have buying power. We can negotiate on their (client’s) behalf with asset managers to provide them lower fees than they otherwise would have to get on their own,” he added.
Mercer Wealth’s clients include sovereign wealth funds, family offices, and insurance companies among others.
From its office in Dubai, Mercer also looks after Africa, India and Turkey, where they also see opportunity for growth.
Wealth creation in Middle East and Africa (MEA) grew 8.5 per cent to $8.1 trillion last year from $7.5tn in 2015, higher than last year’s global average of 6 per cent and the second-highest growth in a region after Asia-Pacific which grew 9.9 per cent, according to consultancy Boston Consulting Group (BCG). In the region, where wealth grew just 1.9 per cent in 2015 compared with 2014, a pickup in oil prices has helped in wealth generation.
BCG is forecasting MEA wealth will rise to $12tn by 2021, growing at an annual average of 8 per cent.
Drivers of wealth generation in the region will be split evenly between new wealth creation and growth of performance of existing assets, according to BCG.
Another general trend in the region is clients’ looking for a comprehensive approach to investing, according to Mr AbuShaban.
“Institutional investors or some of the families are seeing a slowdown in the available capital they have to invest and in that sense they are looking at optimizing the way they manage their portfolios and making sure they are not investing haphazardly and different parts of their investment are working together,” said Mr AbuShaban.
Some clients also have a higher appetite for risk, given the low interest-rate environment that does not provide enough yield for some institutional investors. These clients are keen to invest in illiquid assets, such as private equity and infrastructure.
“What we have seen is a desire for higher returns in what has been a low-return environment specifically in various fixed income or bonds,” he said.
“In this environment, we have seen a de facto increase in the risk that clients are taking in things like illiquid investments, private equity investments, infrastructure and private debt, those kind of investments were higher illiquidity results in incrementally higher returns.”
The Abu Dhabi Investment Authority, one of the largest sovereign wealth funds, said in its 2016 report that has gradually increased its exposure in direct private equity and private credit transactions, mainly in Asian markets and especially in China and India. The authority’s private equity department focused on structured equities owing to “their defensive characteristics.”
How to protect yourself when air quality drops
Install an air filter in your home.
Close your windows and turn on the AC.
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