Category: Market

The Public Works Authority ‘Ashghal’, represented by the Roads Projects Department’s (RPD) Local Areas Infrastructure Program, won 3 global awards in 2022 from Harvard Business Council (HBC), which is based in New York, USA. Through these awards, the Council aims to honor organizations worldwide that demonstrate commitment and excellence in different categories. The Local Areas Infrastructure Program won the Health and Safety Award and Green Award both in Diamond level, and the Gold level in “Dealing with COVID-19” Award.

Ashghal won 3 awards, out of 63 winners who managed to reach the required milestones, out of 439 candidates from around the world.

On this occasion, Eng. Saoud Al-Tamimi, Ashghal’s RPD Manager, commended the Authority’s continuous accomplishments, especially with the RPD’s constant winning of globally renowned rewards for successive years in different fields.”

“The HBC awards won recently by the Department will be added to the long list of global awards. This reiterates the Authority’s commitment to adopt the best practices and demonstrates its excellence in providing top quality services, whilst safeguarding the local environment, resources, and promoting the safety of its workers,” he said.

Eng. Al Tamimi added: “Winning the diamond level in Health and Safety Award and the Green Award from HBC, in addition to the Gold award in “Dealing with COVID-19,” certifies the Authority’s ability to deal with crises and maintain its operations and project delivery with top quality and under these difficult circumstances without compromising the health and safety of workers, and whilst preserving the local environment, making the best use of resources, promoting sustainability, and spreading awareness and best practices constantly in these domains, as these are the cornerstones of Ashghal’s project implementation strategy.”

According to the Harvard Business Council, Ashghal has shown its excellence in the Health and Safety category by prioritizing the protection of its staff and the public through constant work zone audits and inspections, interviewing and coordinating with managers and workers, and engaging all staff, regardless of their job grades, in everything related to occupational safety and health. In addition, the Authority conducted risk analysis and assessment, and set out an effective method for proactive risk identification and management.

“What enabled Ashghal to achieve such a high rank in the Green Award – Diamond level was its leading position in the construction sector in Qatar, regarding spreading awareness and promoting sustainability culture, and its commitment to engaging and encouraging all stakeholders from consulting companies, contractors, suppliers, workers, and others, to adopt positive environmental practices, create solutions and new methods, and apply them throughout the different stages of project implementation,” the Council said.

As for the Dealing with COVID-19 Award (Gold level), the Authority demonstrated readiness, flexibility, and tenacity in facing such a sudden and devastating health crisis like the pandemic that has affected the whole world. Building on the “Put People First” principle, the organization continued to deliver quality services to the community while ensuring that its employees and their families stayed safe. Moreover, they demonstrated that decisive leadership is essential to foster swift response, good collaboration, timely communication, and evidence-based decisions, which are critical to mitigate any adverse effects of a crisis of such magnitude.

It’s worth noting that RPD’s Local Areas Infrastructure Program has recently won 9 international health and safety awards for the third year in a row from the British Safety Council, in addition to the Communitas’ Ethical and Environmental Sustainability Award in 2022, which was awarded by the US-based Communitas Organization. The Communitas Awards aim to recognize exceptional organizations and individuals who manage to safeguard resources, and those who are changing how they do business to benefit their communities.

Harvard Business Council is an organization aimed at recognizing and rewarding those who distinguish themselves for excellence and best practices in salient areas for the environment and society, and Ashghal has undoubtedly proved to fit this description.

Source: Ashghal

H.H. Sheikh Abdullah bin Zayed Al Nahyan, Minister of Foreign Affairs and International Cooperation, has received Nikos Dendias, Minister of Foreign Affairs of Greece.

During the meeting, held over a business dinner banquet in Abu Dhabi, the two sides discussed opportunities to strengthen prospects of joint cooperation across various fields within the framework of the strategic partnership between the two countries.

They also reviewed issues of mutual interest, including developments on the regional and global arenas.

Sheikh Abdullah welcomed the visit of Dendias, praising the growing strategic relations between the UAE and Greece and their fruitful cooperation across various domains.

The UAE top diplomat affirmed that the UAE-Greece diplomatic relations, which began in 1976, have witnessed continuous progress, noting to the qualitative leaps achieved by the 2020 strategic partnership signed between them.

For his part, Nikos Dendias offered his condolences on the passing of Sheikh Khalifa bin Zayed, and wished continuing progress and prosperity for the UAE under the wise leadership of President His Highness Sheikh Mohamed bin Zayed Al Nahyan.

The Greek Minister also highlighted his country’s pride in the relations it enjoys with the UAE and their strategic partnership.

Source: Ministry of Foreign Affairs & International Cooperation

Riyadh, Saudi Minister of Industry and Mineral Resources, Chairman of the Manufacturing Vaccines and Vital Medicines Committee, Bandar bin Ibrahim Alkhorayef, announced the launch of several investment opportunities in the vaccines and vital medicines industry, valued at $3.4 billion, to achieve the Kingdom’s goals aimed at achieving pharmaceutical and health security, and making Saudi Arabia an important center for this promising industry.

The Minister stressed that the targeted pharmaceutical sectors in general, whose value exceeds $5 billion, will be implemented in several stages, starting with vaccines and vital medicines, as the first phase will focus on localizing vaccines, plasma, and insulin technologies, Saudi Press Agency (SPA) reported.

He stressed the importance of transferring their full technologies to contribute mainly to building the Kingdom’s capabilities in these sectors and achieving health and pharmaceutical security while reducing the high cost on the state budget, which currently imports 100% of vaccines and vital pharmaceutical products, while the vital medicines sector enjoys the fastest growth rate in the market among all pharmaceutical sectors with an annual rate of 17%.

Alkhorayef said that the Manufacturing Vaccines and Vital Medicines Committee will focus in the first phase on localizing basic children’s vaccines and building the necessary self-capacities and manufacturing platforms to combat future pandemics, followed by insulin production to treat diabetes patients and then support plasma collection centers with a world-class factory to achieve self-sufficiency in plasma derivatives, while the second phase will focus on localizing immunological and cancer treatments technologies, where the size of this vital sector is estimated at more than $2 billion annually, of which insulin represents approximately $340 million.

The minister explained that the Manufacturing Vaccines and Vital Medicines Committee aims to achieve positive results by identifying the best technologies in the field of vaccines and vital medicines, in which the Kingdom must invest to transfer and localize knowledge, in addition to building local industrial platforms with international specifications to enable the Kingdom to occupy its natural place as an industrial power and a logistical platform for vaccines and vital medicines in the Middle East and the Muslim countries.

The committee, which was formed by a Cabinet decision in March 2022, chaired by the Minister of Industry and Mineral Resources, is working on organizing and developing vital medicines, setting a strategy for regulating the vaccines and vital medicines industry, related programs, and plans, supervising their implementation, setting rules and standards for building factories for vaccines and vital medicines and taking all necessary procedures concerning the construction of those factories.

Source: Bahrain News Agency

The President of the Wallonia Provincial Parliament, Mr. Jean-Claude Marcourt, has received the UAE Ambassador to the Kingdom of Belgium, the European Union, and the Grand Duchy of Luxembourg, His Excellency Mohamed Al Sahlawi.

President Marcourt used the occasion to offer Wallonia’s condolences on the passing of Sheikh Khalifa bin Zayed Al Nahyan and extend his congratulations on the election of His Highness Sheikh Mohamed bin Zayed Al Nahyan as UAE President.

The meeting discussed bilateral relations between the UAE and Wallonia, as well as ways to enhance cooperation, especially in the fields of economy, industry, and commerce.

His Excellency Mohamed Al Sahlawi also took the opportunity to thank Wallonia for its participation in Expo 2020 Dubai and for arranging the Wallonia-Brussels Visibility Week at the Belgian Pavilion.

The Wallonia region has a representative office in the UAE, with the Wallonia Export and Investment Agency in Dubai and Abu Dhabi.

Source: Ministry of Foreign Affairs & International Cooperation

Bangkok, Shares were higher in Asia on Friday, despite data suggesting economies are slowing. The advance tracked gains on Wall Street, where the market is headed for its first weekly gain after three weeks of punishing losses.

Tokyo’s Nikkei 225 index added 1.2% to 26,491.97 and the Kospi in Seoul jumped 2.4% to 2,369.16. Hong Kong’s Hang Seng advanced 2% to 21,707.92 and the Shanghai Composite index added 1% to 3,354.63.

In Australia, the S&P/ASX 200 gained 0.8% to 6,577.40. Shares also rose in India and Taiwan, The Associated Press (AP) reported.

U.S. and European futures also were higher.

Market players are looking ahead to U.S. inflation data due next week. They appeared to shrug off preliminary data showing a slowing of factory activity in several countries including Japan.

The manufacturing manager surveys of “several developed economies came in lower-than-expected in both the manufacturing and services sector, which points to a broad-based moderation in economic activities,” Jun Rong Yeap of IG said in a commentary.

A report Friday showed inflation in Japan remained at 2.1% in May, pushed higher by energy costs and a weaker currency. However, underlying core inflation, which excludes volatile costs for energy and fresh foods, remained at 0.8% and the central bank is unlikely to follow the example of the U.S. Federal Reserve and other central banks in raising interest rates, analysts said.

The Bank of Japan “isn’t convinced that this will be sustainable because wage growth remains soft and higher energy costs are weighing on corporate profits and consumer sentiment,” Marcel Thieliant of Capital Economics said in a report.

On Wall Street, trading was wobbly as investors focused on another round of testimony before Congress by Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell. He told a House committee the Fed hopes to rein in the worst inflation in four decades without knocking the economy into a recession, but acknowledged “that path has gotten more and more challenging.”

The S&P 500 ended 1% higher at 3,795.73 after having been down as much as 0.4%. The Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 0.6% to 30,677.36 and the Nasdaq gained 1.6% to 11,232.19.

Smaller company stocks also gained ground. The Russell 2000 rose 1.3% to 1,711.67.

Trading has been turbulent in recent weeks as investors try to determine whether a recession is looming. The benchmark S&P 500 is currently in a bear market. That means it has dropped more than 20% from its most recent high, which was in January. The index has fallen for 10 of the last 11 weeks.

On Thursday, Powell stressed: “I don’t think that a recession is inevitable.” He has said it’s ”certainly a possibility” and that the central bank is facing a more challenging task amid the war in Ukraine essentially pushing oil and other commodity prices even higher and making inflation even more pervasive.

Powell spoke to Congress a week after the Fed raised its benchmark interest rate by three quarters of a percentage point, its biggest hike in nearly three decades. Fed policymakers also forecast a more accelerated pace of rate hikes this year and next than they had predicted three months ago, with its key rate to reach 3.8% by the end of 2023. That would be its highest level in 15 years.

The Labor Department reported Thursday that fewer Americans applied for jobless benefits last week, though it was slightly more than economists expected. The solid job market is a relatively bright point in an otherwise weakening economy, with consumer sentiment and retail sales showing increasing damage from inflation.

As higher prices stretch pocketbooks, consumers are shifting spending from big ticket items like electronics to necessities. The pressure has been worsened by record-high gasoline prices that show no sign of abating.

Big technology and health care companies did much of the heavy lifting. Microsoft rose 2.3% and Johnson & Johnson rose 2.2%.

Energy stocks fell as the price of U.S. crude oil dropped 1.8%. Valero fell 7.6%.

Early Friday, U.S. benchmark crude oil was up 36 cents at $104.63 per barrel in electronic trading on the New York Mercantile Exchange. Brent crude, the basis for pricing for international trading, shed 9 cents to $106.55 per barrel.

Bond yields fell significantly. The yield on the 10-year Treasury note, which helps set mortgage rates, fell to 3.09% from 3.15% late Wednesday.

The U.S. dollar fell to 134.73 Japanese yen from 134.94 yen. The euro rose to $1.0539 from $1.0524.

Source: Bahrain News Agency

Baghdad / NINA / – Lebanon and Egypt signed, today, Tuesday, an agreement to transport 650 million cubic meters of gas annually from Egypt to Lebanon via Syria.

Under the agreement, which was signed at a ceremony held at the Lebanese Ministry of Energy in Beirut, “the gas will be pumped through a pipeline to the Deir Ammar power station in northern Lebanon, where it can add about 450 megawatts to the grid, equivalent to about 4 additional hours of electricity per day.”

The state-run Lebanese Electricity Company produces the equivalent of just several hours of energy per day, forcing many to pay expensive subscriptions to private generators.

The agreement is part of a US-backed effort to address power outages in Lebanon by transferring electricity from Jordan and natural gas from Egypt through Syria.

Lebanon is counting on Egyptian gas, along with a separate deal to import electricity from Jordan, which will raise the country’s electricity supply to cover a period of up to 10 hours a day from only two hours currently.

The two deals represent a cornerstone in the Lebanese government’s plan to reform the electricity sector, by increasing energy supplies and then raising prices, in an attempt to bridge the deficit of the state-run electricity company amid a severe economic crisis.

The World Bank pledged to finance the two deals on condition of reforms in the Lebanese electricity sector, which has contributed tens of billions of dollars to the country’s huge public debt.

The Lebanese Cabinet approved a plan to reform the electricity sector in March, but it has not yet implemented the main components of the plan.

The plans, which together will add up to 700 megawatts to the Lebanese electricity grid, were first introduced in the summer of 2021 but have faced several delays./End

Source: National Iraqi News Agency

Tokyo, June 23 (BNA): Japan’s factory activity growth slowed to a four-month low in June as China’s COVID-19 curbs disrupted supply chains, while many other economies in Asia were also facing headwinds amid growing risks to the outlook from a potential U.S. recession.

Australia’s manufacturing activity held steady this month, data showed on Thursday which, together with Japan’s figures, come ahead of a string of European and U.S. purchasing managers’ index (PMI) surveys due out later in the day, Reuters reports.

The readings will be closely scrutinised as financial markets fret over sharp interest rises by the Federal Reserve, and further aggressive tightening planned over coming months, which have substantially raised the risk of a U.S. recession.

“The global macroeconomic outlook has deteriorated materially since end-2021,” said Fitch Ratings, which slashed this year’s global growth outlook to 2.9% in June from 3.5% in March.

“Stagflation, which is characterised by persistent high inflation, high unemployment and weak demand, has become the dominant risk theme since late 1Q22 and a plausible potential risk scenario,” it said in a report released this week.

A growing number of market players, including U.S. investment firm PIMCO, are warning of the risk of a recession as central banks across the globe tighten monetary policy to fight persistently high inflation.

A string of recent data globally showed policymakers are walking a tight rope as they try to defuse inflation pressures without tipping their respective economies into a steep downturn.

U.S. retail sales unexpectedly fell in May and existing home sales tumbled to a two-year low, a sign high inflation and rising borrowing costs were starting to hurt demand.

Britain’s economy unexpectedly shrank in April, adding to fears of a sharp slowdown as companies complain of rising cost of production.

In Asia, South Korea’s exports for the first 10 days of June shrank almost 13% year-on-year, underscoring the heightening risk to the region’s export-driven economies.

And in China, while exporters enjoyed solid sales in May, helped by easing domestic COVID-19 curbs, many analysts expect a more challenging outlook for the world’s second-biggest economy due to the Ukraine war and rising raw material costs.

The au Jibun Bank flash Japan Manufacturing PMI slipped to 52.7 in June from 53.3 in May, marking the slowest expansion since February, the survey showed on Thursday.

In a sign of the pandemic’s lingering impact, auto giant Toyota Motor Corp cut its July global production plan by 50,000 vehicles as semiconductor shortages and COVID-19 parts supply disruptions continued to curb output

“Despite the recent easing of lockdowns in China, suppliers’ delivery times continued to lengthen last month, albeit at a slightly slower pace,” said Marcel Thieliant, senior Japan economist at Capital Economics.

The key for Japan will be whether consumption rebounds strongly enough from a pandemic-induced slump, to offset emerging external headwinds such as an expected U.S. slowdown, analysts say.

The PMIs of France, Germany, euro-zone, Britain and the United States are due out later on Thursday.

Source: Bahrain News Agency

Brussels, June 23 (BNA): The European Commission proposed on Wednesday legally binding targets to halve the use of chemical pesticides and restore nature across the EU, in an attempt to better protect health and recover plunging wildlife populations.

European Union environment policy chief Virginijus Sinkevicius told Reuters the proposal on repairing habitats would require EU countries to take steps to restore nature to at least 20% of EU land by 2030 and all degraded ecosystems by mid-century, Reuters reports.

Under the proposals, the use of chemical pesticides should also be cut by 50% by the end of this decade. They will be banned altogether in sensitive places such as public parks and protected areas.

A senior EU Commission official acknowledged studies showing that a significant drop in use of pesticides could lead to lower yields and higher food prices, but stressed that new techniques were now available which can effectively replace chemical pesticides without reducing agriculture output.

The rules on pesticides, if approved by EU governments, would replace the existing laxer law that the Commission said had been applied inconsistently across the EU.

Under the new regime, governments would have to submit regular reports on their progress towards the targets.

“Nothing can replace ecosystem services that the oceans provide, our soils or our forests,” Sinkevicius said in an interview about the proposal to restore nature, which would be the EU’s first such law.

The proposed law lays down binding goals to increase farmland bird populations, reverse the decline of pollinators, and restore 25,000 km (15,500 miles) of rivers to flow along their natural courses by 2030. Countries will have to produce national plans to contribute to the EU-wide aims.

Intensive farming, forestry and urbanisation are fuelling the degradation of natural habitats. Most of Europe’s protected habitats and species have a negative conservation status, and a third of bee and butterfly species have declining populations.

The proposal on nature, which has been delayed twice, will need approval from the European Parliament and EU countries – some of whom have sought to delay or roll back sustainable farming measures.

He warned that failing to stop the degradation of nature would ultimately diminish Europe’s farming abilities.

“If we lose soil fertility, if soil erosion and degradation continue, that is going to have a major impact on our agricultural output,” he said. Soil erosion already costs Europe around 1.2 billion euros ($1.3 billion) a year in lost agricultural production.

Economic activities like farming would not be banned on land where nature restoration measures are rolled out, under the EU law.

Source: Bahrain News Agency

Beijing/Hong Kong, June 23 (BNA): Asian shares wobbled while commodity prices fell on Thursday as mounting worries about the risks of a global recession amid aggressive rate hikes by the Federal Reserve kept broad investor sentiment fragile.

MSCI’s broadest index of Asia-Pacific shares outside Japan reversed earlier gains to be mostly flat in Asia trade. Stocks in South Korea were off, while Japan’s Nikkei was broadly unchanged, Reuters reports.

Hong Kong’s Hang Seng Index climbed 0.6%, following the news that Chinese President Xi Jinping chaired a top-level meeting on Wednesday that approved a plan for the healthy development of China’s large payment firms and fintech sector.

Overnight, the dollar fell alongside U.S. Treasury yields after Fed Chair Jerome Powell, in testimony to the U.S. Senate Banking Committee, acknowledged a recession was “certainly a possibility”, but the Fed is not trying to engineer one.

A Reuters poll showed the Fed will deliver another 75-basis-point interest rate hike in July, followed by a half-percentage-point rise in September, and won’t scale back to quarter-percentage-point moves until November at the earliest.

“What is clear is the market views a recession as increasingly likely, a view heard from Powell, who detailed that a recession was a possibility but not their intention,” said Chris Weston, head of research at brokerage Pepperstone in Melbourne.

“Equities have held in well despite the falls in commodities, altogether there has been rotation into low-risk areas of the market and defensive sectors, with predictable outflows from energy and materials stock.”

U.S. stocks reversed earlier gains and ended the session slightly down. The Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 0.15%, the S&P 500 lost 0.13%, and the Nasdaq Composite dropped 0.15%.

Investors are continuing to assess the risks of central banks pushing the world economy into recession as they attempt to curb inflation with interest rate increases.

Concerns about the demand outlook have sapped commodity prices, with oil on Thursday falling to the lowest level in more than a month. Brent crude was down 2% to $109.49 per barrel and U.S. crude declined 2.3% to $103.75 a barrel.

The yield on benchmark 10-year Treasury notes were down slightly in early trade to 3.1430%, the lowest in almost two weeks, compared with its U.S. close of 3.156% the previous day.

The two-year yield, which rises with traders’ expectations of higher Fed fund rates, touched 3.0391% compared with a U.S. close of 3.056%.

In the foreign exchange markets, the dollar eased 0.1% against a basket of major currencies, following a 0.2% fall the previous session.

However, the index was up more than 8% this year, reflecting the broad risk-off sentiment and the dollar’s Fed-driven yield advantage.

Those factors were underscored by the South Korean won, which fell below a psychological threshold of 1,300 per dollar for the first time in 13 years, amid global economic recession worries.

Gold was slightly lower, with spot prices traded at $1835.19 per ounce.

Source: Bahrain News Agency

Manama, June 22 (BNA): Central Bank of Bahrain (CBB) announces that the BD 35 million monthly issue of Government Treasury Bills has been oversubscribed by 161%.

The bills, carrying a maturity of 182 days, are issued by the CBB, on behalf of the government of Bahrain.

The issue date of the bills is June 26, and the maturity date is December 25.

The weighted average rate of interest is 4.17% compared to 3.15% of the previous issue on May 29, 2022.

The approximate average price for the issue was 97.933%, with the lowest accepted price being 97.872%.

This is issue No. 1918 (ISIN BH000794D0W6) of Government Treasury Bills. With this, the total outstanding value of Government Treasury Bills is BD 2.010 billion.

Source: Bahrain News Agency