Dubai companies may sell bonds to raise cash in next few years

Dubai companies may sell bonds to raise cash during the next few years because investor demand for new share offerings will remain depressed, the emirate's chief financial regulator said.

"In the next two to three years bonds will play a far more critical role in the financing of companies rather than equity," Paul Koster, chief executive of the Dubai Financial Services Authority, said in an interview in Singapore on the sidelines of the Islamic Financial Services Board summit. "In terms of IPOs for equities there will be very little."

Companies in the United Arab Emirates sold Dh1.89 billion of equity in three initial public offerings during the past year as benchmark stock indexes for Dubai and Abu Dhabi, the biggest of seven states that make up the UAE, tumbled more than 47 per cent, according to data compiled by Bloomberg.