Middle East Deals: #Oman M&A Up 145% Undisturbed by Covid-19 - Bloomberg

Middle East Deals: Oman M&A Up 145% Undisturbed by Covid-19 - Bloomberg:

News of the global slump in mergers in acquisitions hasn’t reached the farthest corner of the Arabian Peninsula, where a string of potential $1 billion-plus energy deals is helping Oman defy the gloom.

The value of announced or proposed transactions involving an Omani target has risen 145% in the last 12 months, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. That compares with a 6% fall globally, owing to the impact of the coronavirus crisis.

And that doesn’t even include potential sales by BP Plc and Occidental Petroleum Corp. The western oil producers are both exploring divestments of more than $1 billion in Oman, Bloomberg News has reported.

If these and further planned privatizations by the state are completed, it would make 2020 the best-ever year for deals involving targets in the oil-rich sultanate, the data shows.

Gold Smuggling News: UN Says Networks From Congo to #Dubai - Bloomberg

Gold Smuggling News: UN Says Networks From Congo to Dubai - Bloomberg:

Gold smuggling from eastern Democratic Republic of Congo is costing the impoverished country millions of dollars in tax revenue and funding conflict and criminal networks that stretch across Africa and beyond, according to a United Nations Group of Experts report.

Congo’s official exports of hand-dug gold bear almost no relation to reality, the group said Friday, with smuggled gold ending up in Uganda, Burundi, Rwanda, the United Arab Emirates and Tanzania.

Congo is one of the “region’s largest artisanal gold producers, and yet one of its smallest official exporters,” the group said in its annual report on Congo’s ongoing conflicts published on the website of the UN Security Council.

Official production of artisanal gold in Congo was 333.4 kilograms (735 pounds) last year, while the country only exported 39.4 kilograms worth about $1.3 million, according to Mines Ministry statistics.

Abraaj Ex-CEO’s Theft Totals $385 Million, Liquidators Claim - Bloomberg

Abraaj Ex-CEO’s Theft Totals $385 Million, Liquidators Claim - Bloomberg:

Arif Naqvi

 Photographer: Vivek Prakash/Bloomberg

Liquidators overseeing Abraaj Group’s insolvency now estimate Chief Executive Officer Arif Naqvi’s alleged theft to have cost the firm $385 million, an amount significantly more than what prosecutors claimed.

Naqvi is one of six former Abraaj executives who face charges stemming from the private equity’s firm’s 2018 collapse. In court papers last year, U.S. prosecutors said Naqvi stole more than $250 million. But in a new filing on Friday, the liquidators put the losses much higher, claiming Naqvi stole $385 million from 2009 to 2018 as he moved money for his own use in more than 3,700 transactions.

The liquidators are at work trying to trace the transactions and have asked a New York judge for permission to file subpoenas on 18 banks. The information will be used in a planned lawsuit in the Cayman Islands seeking to recover funds to pay the firm’s investors and creditors.

Abraaj managed more than 40 private equity funds and assets of more than $14 billion until it crumbled in the biggest failure for a private equity firm. Naqvi, who has denied wrongdoing, is under house arrest in London facing possible extradition to the U.S. His lawyer didn’t respond to an email seeking comment after business hours in the U.K.