Saudi Arabia Taps BlackRock (BLK) to Build Mortgage-Backed Securities Market - Bloomberg
Saudi Arabia has hired the world’s biggest fund manager to help it develop a market for mortgage-backed securities as the kingdom looks to improve the affordability of its housing stock.
The country hopes developing a secondary market for mortgages would allow banks to offer borrowers lower interest rates and improve the cost of home ownership, BlackRock Inc. Chief Executive Officer Larry Fink said at a conference in Johannesburg.
“Spreads are much wider than if there was a securitization market,” Fink said. “It would be much narrower and the homeowners would benefit, so the cost of home ownership would go down.”
Fink’s comments come just months after BlackRock signed an agreement with Saudi Real Estate Refinance Company — the state-owned equivalent of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac in the US — to to develop the real estate finance market in the kingdom. As part of the deal, the two agreed to look for ways to diversify funding sources through fixed income markets.
The agreement is part of Saudi Arabia’s plans to try to raise home ownership rates to 70% by 2030, a key part of Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman’s plans to boost the kingdom’s economy by easing its dependence on crude oil and instead become a hub for everything from entertainment to tourism to manufacturing.
Tuesday, 22 October 2024
Gulf bourses end lower on geopolitical tensions | Reuters
Gulf bourses end lower on geopolitical tensions | Reuters
Stock markets in the Gulf ended lower on Tuesday as geopolitical tension gripped the region and corporate earnings failed to lift investor sentiment.
Lebanon's Hezbollah movement said on Tuesday there would be no negotiations while fighting continued with Israel, and claimed sole responsibility for a drone attack on Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's holiday home.
U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken arrived in Israel on Tuesday for meetings with Israeli leaders, the first stop of a wider Middle East tour to launch another push for an elusive ceasefire.
Saudi Arabia's benchmark index (.TASI), opens new tab dropped 0.4%, hit by a 1.1% fall in ACWA Power Company (2082.SE), opens new tab and a 1.8% decrease in Middle East Pharmaceutical Industries (4016.SE), opens new tab.
Elsewhere, oil giant Saudi National Bank (1180.SE), opens new tab edged 0.1% lower, despite reporting a rise in third quarter net profit.
The International Monetary Fund lowered its GDP growth forecast for Saudi Arabia for 2024 to 1.5% and estimated growth would accelerate to 4.6% next year in its latest World Economic Outlook Report released on Tuesday.
The IMF projects oil prices will rise by 0.9% in 2024 to about $81 a barrel. It has previously said Saudi Arabia needs prices at close to $100 per barrel to balance its budget.
Dubai's main share index (.DFMGI), opens new tab eased 0.2%, with leading lender Emirates NBD (ENBD.DU), opens new tab losing 1.3%.
In Abu Dhabi, the index (.FTFADGI), opens new tab fell 0.3%.
The Qatari benchmark (.QSI), opens new tab lost 0.3%, as Qatar Islamic Bank (QISB.QA), opens new tab declined 1.7%.
However, Doha Bank (DOBK.QA), opens new tab gained 0.8%, following a rise in nine-month net profit.
Outside the Gulf, Egypt's blue-chip index (.EGX30), opens new tab finished 0.1% lower, weighed down by a 9.2% slide in Abu Qir Fertilizers (ABUK.CA), opens new tab.
Lebanon's Hezbollah movement said on Tuesday there would be no negotiations while fighting continued with Israel, and claimed sole responsibility for a drone attack on Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's holiday home.
U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken arrived in Israel on Tuesday for meetings with Israeli leaders, the first stop of a wider Middle East tour to launch another push for an elusive ceasefire.
Saudi Arabia's benchmark index (.TASI), opens new tab dropped 0.4%, hit by a 1.1% fall in ACWA Power Company (2082.SE), opens new tab and a 1.8% decrease in Middle East Pharmaceutical Industries (4016.SE), opens new tab.
Elsewhere, oil giant Saudi National Bank (1180.SE), opens new tab edged 0.1% lower, despite reporting a rise in third quarter net profit.
The International Monetary Fund lowered its GDP growth forecast for Saudi Arabia for 2024 to 1.5% and estimated growth would accelerate to 4.6% next year in its latest World Economic Outlook Report released on Tuesday.
The IMF projects oil prices will rise by 0.9% in 2024 to about $81 a barrel. It has previously said Saudi Arabia needs prices at close to $100 per barrel to balance its budget.
Dubai's main share index (.DFMGI), opens new tab eased 0.2%, with leading lender Emirates NBD (ENBD.DU), opens new tab losing 1.3%.
In Abu Dhabi, the index (.FTFADGI), opens new tab fell 0.3%.
The Qatari benchmark (.QSI), opens new tab lost 0.3%, as Qatar Islamic Bank (QISB.QA), opens new tab declined 1.7%.
However, Doha Bank (DOBK.QA), opens new tab gained 0.8%, following a rise in nine-month net profit.
Outside the Gulf, Egypt's blue-chip index (.EGX30), opens new tab finished 0.1% lower, weighed down by a 9.2% slide in Abu Qir Fertilizers (ABUK.CA), opens new tab.
Major Gulf bourses retreat as regional tensions swirl | Reuters
Major Gulf bourses retreat as regional tensions swirl | Reuters
Most major stock markets in the Gulf eased in early trade on Tuesday amid geopolitical tensions in the region and with corporate earnings failing to cheer investor sentiment.
Hezbollah said it had fired rockets at two bases near the Israeli city of Tel Aviv and a naval base west of Haifa on Tuesday morning just hours before U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken arrived in Israel to make another push for an elusive ceasefire.
Iran's Foreign Minister Abbas Araqchi, at a news conference in Kuwait during a regional tour, said Tehran does not seek war in the Middle East and has made efforts to reduce tensions but is prepared for any conflict.
Saudi Arabia's benchmark index (.TASI), opens new tab eased 0.1%, with ACWA Power Company (2082.SE), opens new tab losing 0.9% and oil giant Saudi Aramco (2222.SE), opens new tab falling 0.4%.
Oil prices - a catalyst for the Gulf's financial markets -eased as the top U.S. diplomat renewed efforts to push for a ceasefire in the Middle East and as slowing demand growth in China, the world's top oil importer, continued to weigh on the market.
The country's biggest lender Saudi National Bank (1180.SE), opens new tab meanwhile edged 0.1% higher, after reporting a rise in third-quarter net profit.
Dubai's main share index (.DFMGI), opens new tab declined 0.3%, with utility firm Dubai Electricity and Water Authority (DEWAA.DU), opens new tab retreating 1.2% and top lender Emirates NBD (ENBD.DU), opens new tab was down 0.5%.
In Abu Dhabi, the index (.FTFADGI), opens new tab added 0.1%, helped by a 0.3% increase in conglomerate International Holding (IHC.AD), opens new tab.
The Qatari index (.QSI), opens new tab fell 0.3%, hit by a 0.3% dip in the Gulf's biggest lender Qatar National Bank (QNBK.QA), opens new tab.
However, Doha Bank (DOBK.QA), opens new tab gained 0.6%, following a rise in nine-month net profit.
Most major stock markets in the Gulf eased in early trade on Tuesday amid geopolitical tensions in the region and with corporate earnings failing to cheer investor sentiment.
Hezbollah said it had fired rockets at two bases near the Israeli city of Tel Aviv and a naval base west of Haifa on Tuesday morning just hours before U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken arrived in Israel to make another push for an elusive ceasefire.
Iran's Foreign Minister Abbas Araqchi, at a news conference in Kuwait during a regional tour, said Tehran does not seek war in the Middle East and has made efforts to reduce tensions but is prepared for any conflict.
Saudi Arabia's benchmark index (.TASI), opens new tab eased 0.1%, with ACWA Power Company (2082.SE), opens new tab losing 0.9% and oil giant Saudi Aramco (2222.SE), opens new tab falling 0.4%.
Oil prices - a catalyst for the Gulf's financial markets -eased as the top U.S. diplomat renewed efforts to push for a ceasefire in the Middle East and as slowing demand growth in China, the world's top oil importer, continued to weigh on the market.
The country's biggest lender Saudi National Bank (1180.SE), opens new tab meanwhile edged 0.1% higher, after reporting a rise in third-quarter net profit.
Dubai's main share index (.DFMGI), opens new tab declined 0.3%, with utility firm Dubai Electricity and Water Authority (DEWAA.DU), opens new tab retreating 1.2% and top lender Emirates NBD (ENBD.DU), opens new tab was down 0.5%.
In Abu Dhabi, the index (.FTFADGI), opens new tab added 0.1%, helped by a 0.3% increase in conglomerate International Holding (IHC.AD), opens new tab.
The Qatari index (.QSI), opens new tab fell 0.3%, hit by a 0.3% dip in the Gulf's biggest lender Qatar National Bank (QNBK.QA), opens new tab.
However, Doha Bank (DOBK.QA), opens new tab gained 0.6%, following a rise in nine-month net profit.
Mubadala Said Near Deal for Stake in Health Tech Firm Zelis - Bloomberg #AbuDhabi #UAE
Mubadala Said Near Deal for Stake in Health Tech Firm Zelis - Bloomberg
Mubadala Investment Co. is nearing a deal to acquire a minority stake in Zelis that values the health-care technology company at about $17 billion, people with knowledge of the matter said.
The Abu Dhabi wealth fund is putting the final touches on a deal with Zelis’s owners, Bain Capital and Parthenon Capital, according to the people. Mubadala has agreed to anchor a so-called minority recapitalization of Zelis, one of the people said. Other co-investors will be brought in during the coming weeks, the person said.
Bloomberg News reported in September that Bain and Parthenon were in talks to sell a 20% to 25% stake in the company.
While talks with Mubadala are advanced they could still be delayed or falter, the people said, asking not to be identified discussing confidential information. Representatives for Bain and Mubadala declined to comment, while spokespeople for Parthenon and Zelis couldn’t immediately be reached for comment.
Zelis operates a platform that helps digitize payments in health-care, where billions of dollars of spending is still disbursed using paper checks. The company works with hundreds of health payers to manage claims, negotiate with providers and save money.
In 2019, Bain invested in the merger of Parthenon-backed health-care payments technology companies Zelis Healthcare and RedCard Systems.
Mubadala Investment Co. is nearing a deal to acquire a minority stake in Zelis that values the health-care technology company at about $17 billion, people with knowledge of the matter said.
The Abu Dhabi wealth fund is putting the final touches on a deal with Zelis’s owners, Bain Capital and Parthenon Capital, according to the people. Mubadala has agreed to anchor a so-called minority recapitalization of Zelis, one of the people said. Other co-investors will be brought in during the coming weeks, the person said.
Bloomberg News reported in September that Bain and Parthenon were in talks to sell a 20% to 25% stake in the company.
While talks with Mubadala are advanced they could still be delayed or falter, the people said, asking not to be identified discussing confidential information. Representatives for Bain and Mubadala declined to comment, while spokespeople for Parthenon and Zelis couldn’t immediately be reached for comment.
Zelis operates a platform that helps digitize payments in health-care, where billions of dollars of spending is still disbursed using paper checks. The company works with hundreds of health payers to manage claims, negotiate with providers and save money.
In 2019, Bain invested in the merger of Parthenon-backed health-care payments technology companies Zelis Healthcare and RedCard Systems.
#Oman’s OQ Set to Tee Up Another IPO Days After $2 Billion Deal - Bloomberg
Oman’s OQ Set to Tee Up Another IPO Days After $2 Billion Deal - Bloomberg
Oman’s state energy company OQ SAOC is set to kick off the initial public offering of its methanol and liquefied petroleum gas unit as soon as the end of this month, according to people familiar with the matter.
The firm is seeking a valuation of between $1 billion to $1.5 billion for OQ Base Industries, the people said, asking not to be named while discussing confidential information.
OQ tapped Morgan Stanley as an adviser on the potential listing, Bloomberg News has previously reported, while at least two local banks are also likely to be hired to work on the offering, the people said.
No final decisions have been made on timing or terms of the deal, including valuation. Representatives for OQ Base Industries weren’t immediately available for comment.
The deal would come days after the firm raised a record $2 billion from an IPO of OQ Exploration & Production — the biggest Gulf IPO since Adnoc Gas Plc’s $2.5 billion share sale in 2023.
Oman is in the midst of an aggressive privatisation drive that includes plans to list the state power utility, and logistics firm Asyad. Last year, OQ floated its gas pipelines business in a $749 million IPO.
The OQEP offer drew aggregate demand of $5.4 billion, indicating continued interest in Gulf deals despite escalating violence in the Middle East. Firms in the region have raised just under $8 billion this year through new share sales, according to data compiled by Bloomberg.
Oman’s state energy company OQ SAOC is set to kick off the initial public offering of its methanol and liquefied petroleum gas unit as soon as the end of this month, according to people familiar with the matter.
The firm is seeking a valuation of between $1 billion to $1.5 billion for OQ Base Industries, the people said, asking not to be named while discussing confidential information.
OQ tapped Morgan Stanley as an adviser on the potential listing, Bloomberg News has previously reported, while at least two local banks are also likely to be hired to work on the offering, the people said.
No final decisions have been made on timing or terms of the deal, including valuation. Representatives for OQ Base Industries weren’t immediately available for comment.
The deal would come days after the firm raised a record $2 billion from an IPO of OQ Exploration & Production — the biggest Gulf IPO since Adnoc Gas Plc’s $2.5 billion share sale in 2023.
Oman is in the midst of an aggressive privatisation drive that includes plans to list the state power utility, and logistics firm Asyad. Last year, OQ floated its gas pipelines business in a $749 million IPO.
The OQEP offer drew aggregate demand of $5.4 billion, indicating continued interest in Gulf deals despite escalating violence in the Middle East. Firms in the region have raised just under $8 billion this year through new share sales, according to data compiled by Bloomberg.
Mubadala Capital sees chance to buy up large private equity stakes
Mubadala Capital sees chance to buy up large private equity stakes
An arm of Abu Dhabi’s sovereign wealth fund is preparing a push into private equity markets, spotting what it believes is an opportunity to take over large holdings as buyout groups race to sell assets and return cash to investors.
An arm of Abu Dhabi’s sovereign wealth fund is preparing a push into private equity markets, spotting what it believes is an opportunity to take over large holdings as buyout groups race to sell assets and return cash to investors.
Mubadala Capital, the asset management subsidiary of the $302bn sovereign wealth fund, has raised $3.1bn for its latest private equity fund, surpassing a $2bn target.
It is positioning the fund as a solution to private equity groups seeking to exit large bets, or PE-backed companies managing heavy debt burdens that need fresh capital.
Mubadala’s private equity fund generally is seeking to invest between $150mn to $350mn in equity per investment, but will push that investment to as much as $500mn for “great ideas”. It now manages $24bn, three-quarters of which comes from external investors.
“We’re seeing a lot of limited partners are short on liquidity,” said Oscar Fahlgren, chief investment officer of Mubadala Capital, in an interview with the Financial Times. “There’s a focus on realisations by a lot of funds, and that’s driving interesting opportunities for those of us who are well capitalised.”
This year Mubadala Capital has increased its investment pace, striking large deals to buy credit manager Fortress Investment Group, high end baby stroller brand Bugaboo, and Spanish IT consultancy Babel.
#AbuDhabi’s Billions Enter the Private Credit Craze - Bloomberg #UAE
Abu Dhabi’s Billions Enter the Private Credit Craze - Bloomberg
Abu Dhabi, the self-styled “capital of capital,” is now entering US commercial real estate’s hottest space post-regional banking crisis: private credit
Bigwig Emirati sovereign fund Mubadala completed a $3 billion takeover in May of Fortress Investment Group. To anyone in US commercial real estate (CRE), Fortress is a household – and much-feared – name in debt investing, flexing in marquee deals such as Stuyvesant Town (Fortress subsidiary CWCapital managed the middle-class housing bastion for bondholders after Tishman Speyer’s operatic CMBS default), resurrecting the long-stalled supertall tower at 125 Greenwich Street, and even bankrolling investor Harry Macklowe’s ill-fated EOP skyscraper deal.
The Mubadala takeover needed Treasury approval to go through. But now that it has it, Fortress is upsizing its bets. And it has a $300 billion war chest to do it.
“For us to compete with larger firms like Ares, Apollo and Sixth Street, we need to continue to grow assets, because if we don’t then we’ll be less relevant,” Co-CEO Drew McKnight told Bloomberg this summer (Forget turtles – it’s AUM all the way down).
Much of that firepower is focused on the US regional-banking crisis, which was set off by last year’s collapse of Silicon Valley Bank and quickly infected old-boy lenders that were once darlings of the real estate industry, including Signature Bank and New York Community Bank (NYCB).
The crisis is one that Joshua Pack, Fortress’s other co-CEO, has termed a “trillion-dollar opportunity,” saying in February that the “underlying stress here is just so big that they [regulators] will eventually get to a point where they’re just going to have to utilize private capital to clean up the mess and recapitalize the system.”
Pack’s prediction came true almost instantly: in March, a Steve Mnuchin-led syndicate mounted a $1 billion rescue capital infusion into NYCB, and this summer Fortress splashed out $115 million for a 25% stake in First Foundation, a struggling Texas lender with significant exposure to rent-regulated California multifamily properties. Along with BlackRock and Citadel Securities, Fortress is also a founding investor in the new Texas Stock Exchange.
But Mubadala’s private-credit appetite doesn’t end there. It’s already a backer of Blue Owl, which has a stake in private credit firm HPS Investment Partners – this space, as you’ve probably gathered by now, is fairly interconnected.
And all of these private-credit machinations are playing out as part of a larger financial game of thobes between Abu Dhabi ($1.7 trillion AUM) and its neighboring frenemy, Saudi Arabia ($1.1 trillion AUM), who share a growing desire to diversify away from petrodollars.
Foreign CRE is a big part of that mandate, though equity bets on individual trophy buildings have often gone sideways; Consider Abu Dhabi’s 2008 purchase of a 90% stake in the Chrysler Building at an $800 million valuation; a decade later, it sold the Art Deco icon for just $150 million. Even worse was a deal that was both a financial and reputational black eye: the 2013 purchase of a stake in Manhattan’s Park Lane Hotel from now-fugitive Malaysian financier Jho Low.
Abu Dhabi’s strategy now seems to be more jockey than horse-focused: it launched a $1 billion industrial real estate joint venture with Dallas-based Crow Holdings in 2021, and through its new infrastructure vehicle, MGX, is partnering with BlackRock and Microsoft on a $30 billion AI fund to build data centers and energy projects. The Saudis have already placed their chips on Blackstone when it comes to that red-hot sector, making a $20 billion anchor investment in 2017 into the money manager’s infrastructure fund, which has since amassed a gargantuan data-center portfolio.
All told, Abu Dhabi plans to spend billions on its private credit project, meaning yet another flood of money is entering the space.
Abu Dhabi, the self-styled “capital of capital,” is now entering US commercial real estate’s hottest space post-regional banking crisis: private credit
Bigwig Emirati sovereign fund Mubadala completed a $3 billion takeover in May of Fortress Investment Group. To anyone in US commercial real estate (CRE), Fortress is a household – and much-feared – name in debt investing, flexing in marquee deals such as Stuyvesant Town (Fortress subsidiary CWCapital managed the middle-class housing bastion for bondholders after Tishman Speyer’s operatic CMBS default), resurrecting the long-stalled supertall tower at 125 Greenwich Street, and even bankrolling investor Harry Macklowe’s ill-fated EOP skyscraper deal.
The Mubadala takeover needed Treasury approval to go through. But now that it has it, Fortress is upsizing its bets. And it has a $300 billion war chest to do it.
“For us to compete with larger firms like Ares, Apollo and Sixth Street, we need to continue to grow assets, because if we don’t then we’ll be less relevant,” Co-CEO Drew McKnight told Bloomberg this summer (Forget turtles – it’s AUM all the way down).
Much of that firepower is focused on the US regional-banking crisis, which was set off by last year’s collapse of Silicon Valley Bank and quickly infected old-boy lenders that were once darlings of the real estate industry, including Signature Bank and New York Community Bank (NYCB).
The crisis is one that Joshua Pack, Fortress’s other co-CEO, has termed a “trillion-dollar opportunity,” saying in February that the “underlying stress here is just so big that they [regulators] will eventually get to a point where they’re just going to have to utilize private capital to clean up the mess and recapitalize the system.”
Pack’s prediction came true almost instantly: in March, a Steve Mnuchin-led syndicate mounted a $1 billion rescue capital infusion into NYCB, and this summer Fortress splashed out $115 million for a 25% stake in First Foundation, a struggling Texas lender with significant exposure to rent-regulated California multifamily properties. Along with BlackRock and Citadel Securities, Fortress is also a founding investor in the new Texas Stock Exchange.
But Mubadala’s private-credit appetite doesn’t end there. It’s already a backer of Blue Owl, which has a stake in private credit firm HPS Investment Partners – this space, as you’ve probably gathered by now, is fairly interconnected.
And all of these private-credit machinations are playing out as part of a larger financial game of thobes between Abu Dhabi ($1.7 trillion AUM) and its neighboring frenemy, Saudi Arabia ($1.1 trillion AUM), who share a growing desire to diversify away from petrodollars.
Foreign CRE is a big part of that mandate, though equity bets on individual trophy buildings have often gone sideways; Consider Abu Dhabi’s 2008 purchase of a 90% stake in the Chrysler Building at an $800 million valuation; a decade later, it sold the Art Deco icon for just $150 million. Even worse was a deal that was both a financial and reputational black eye: the 2013 purchase of a stake in Manhattan’s Park Lane Hotel from now-fugitive Malaysian financier Jho Low.
Abu Dhabi’s strategy now seems to be more jockey than horse-focused: it launched a $1 billion industrial real estate joint venture with Dallas-based Crow Holdings in 2021, and through its new infrastructure vehicle, MGX, is partnering with BlackRock and Microsoft on a $30 billion AI fund to build data centers and energy projects. The Saudis have already placed their chips on Blackstone when it comes to that red-hot sector, making a $20 billion anchor investment in 2017 into the money manager’s infrastructure fund, which has since amassed a gargantuan data-center portfolio.
All told, Abu Dhabi plans to spend billions on its private credit project, meaning yet another flood of money is entering the space.