Some of Dubai’s ‘big names’ should have been allowed to fail, says Al Ansari - Politics & Economics - ArabianBusiness.com

Some of Dubai’s ‘big names’ should have been allowed to fail, says Al Ansari - Politics & Economics - ArabianBusiness.com:



"Some of the big name Dubai companies that ran up massive debts during the downturn should have been allowed to fail, but the culture was that bankruptcy was seen as a taboo option, a close former advisor of Dubai’s Ruler told Arabian Business.



“There were a lot of the discussions in 2009 and 2010 where with some companies it actually made sense to let them go through a bankruptcy liquidation process because frankly it would have cost the shareholders less and cost the bank less,” said Sameer Al Ansari, who served as Group Chief Financial Officer for The Executive Office of Dubai Ruler Sheikh Mohammed Bin Rashid Al Maktoum, and was the founding chairman and CEO of Dubai International Capital, the emirate’s defacto sovereign wealth fund.



Dubai’s rapid growth and investment in overseas assets and lavish local projects meant it was one of the locations hardest hit by the global recession as property prices fell by nearly 60 percent, around half of projects were put on hold and it was faced with billions of dollars in debt repayments."



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