Saudi Arabia’s introduction of short-selling to its stock exchange was a regionally historic moment. Despite the elevation of Qatar and the UAE to MSCI Emerging Market status in 2013, none of the exchanges in the Gulf had introduced the concept before the beginning of 2017. The issue has been on the developmental agenda of exchange authorities...
Within the global Islamic financial services (IFS) industry, Saudi Arabia occupies a prominent position. The professional services firm EY identifies the country as one of the nine core markets that is driving the growth of Islamic banking, along with Bahrain, Qatar, Indonesia, Malaysia, the UAE, Turkey, Kuwait and Pakistan. Together, these...
Subdued oil prices deflated investor sentiment across the GCC throughout most of 2017. However, mid-2017 brought some encouraging developments: news of a possible MSCI reclassification resulted in a spike in the main index of the Saudi Stock Exchange (Tadawul) in the summer of 2017. In 2016 the government launched the National Transformation...
Increasing Saudi Arabia’s attractiveness as an investment destination is a broad effort, involving a number of government entities and alterations to the regulatory frameworks. Almost all of the ministry-level strategies found in the National Transformation Programme (NTP) 2020 have a bearing on the issue of investment, and their success will...
Despite the effects of lower international oil prices placing downward pressure on sector profitability, Saudi Arabia’s banks have succeeded in expanding their assets over the past year. While the trend of lower profits is likely to prevail over the medium term, the Kingdom’s banks are well positioned to capitalise on the growth opportunities...
Although Saudi Arabia has the largest insurance market in the GCC by far, its life segment remains underdeveloped. However, the years ahead may see greater focus on the line. Once life insurance begins to take off it should yield impressive results, as the Kingdom has both the volume and the wealth to be a good fit for this type of coverage....
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