Containers are seen at Abu Dhabi's Khalifa Port, UAE. A UK-GCC FTA could be worth £61.5 billion, according to the UK government. Reuters
Containers are seen at Abu Dhabi's Khalifa Port, UAE. A UK-GCC FTA could be worth £61.5 billion, according to the UK government. Reuters
Containers are seen at Abu Dhabi's Khalifa Port, UAE. A UK-GCC FTA could be worth £61.5 billion, according to the UK government. Reuters
Containers are seen at Abu Dhabi's Khalifa Port, UAE. A UK-GCC FTA could be worth £61.5 billion, according to the UK government. Reuters

Business

'Good progress' made in free trade talks between GCC and UK

UK government confirms that fifth round of talks aimed at creating a free trade agreement with the GCC successfully concluded in Riyadh

Matthew Davies
Matthew Davies
London

November 23, 2023

  • English
  • Arabic

The latest round of trade talks between the UK and the GCC made “good progress” towards the creation of a free-trade agreement (FTA), the British government officially announced.

The fifth round took place in Riyadh between 5-16 November with a number of UK negotiators travelling to the Saudi capital and others attending the talks virtually.

“Draft treaty text was advanced across the majority of chapters,” the UK government said.

“Technical discussions were held across 21 policy areas over 40 sessions.”

The UK's Business and Trade Minister, Dominic Johnson, told The National that the key to doing any trade was to “keep momentum and goodwill on both sides”.

“We’re very committed and determined to doing a deal with the GCC – they are massive treading partners of the UK.

“So, the symbiotic relationship between the Gulf states and the UK is pretty unparalleled in terms of the purity of the economic advantage.”

Latest calculations project that a UK-GCC FTA would be worth around £61.5 billion.

Dominic Johnson, Minister of State in the UK Department for Business and Trade. "We’re very committed and determined to doing a deal with the GCC," he said.
Dominic Johnson, Minister of State in the UK Department for Business and Trade. "We’re very committed and determined to doing a deal with the GCC," he said.

'Comprehensive agreement'

The UK's department of business and trade said a future FTA would be “a substantial economic opportunity and a significant moment in the UK-GCC relationship” and announced that a sixth round of talks is expected to take place in the first quarter of next year.

On average talks to create FTAs usually take 12 rounds.

Analysts say the initial stages of trade negotiations are the easiest, while the later rounds are trickier and more complex as the focus becomes tighter and the details finer.

“These things do take time, especially when you’re dealing with six countries and 30-plus chapters,” Simon Penney, a former UK trade commissioner for the Middle East and now head of the Middle East at Gemcorp Capital, told The National.

“Once you start getting into the nitty-gritty of regulations and individual tariffs against individual line items, it will take time to get there.

“But we are confident. We wouldn’t have got into this if we did believe in it and I’m confident we will strike a comprehensive agreement, which we hope to do as soon as we possibly can.”

Farage on Muslim Brotherhood

Nigel Farage told Reform's annual conference that the party will proscribe the Muslim Brotherhood if he becomes Prime Minister.
"We will stop dangerous organisations with links to terrorism operating in our country," he said. "Quite why we've been so gutless about this – both Labour and Conservative – I don't know.
“All across the Middle East, countries have banned and proscribed the Muslim Brotherhood as a dangerous organisation. We will do the very same.”
It is 10 years since a ground-breaking report into the Muslim Brotherhood by Sir John Jenkins.
Among the former diplomat's findings was an assessment that “the use of extreme violence in the pursuit of the perfect Islamic society” has “never been institutionally disowned” by the movement.
The prime minister at the time, David Cameron, who commissioned the report, said membership or association with the Muslim Brotherhood was a "possible indicator of extremism" but it would not be banned.

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Junichiro Tamizaki
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Who's who in Yemen conflict

Houthis: Iran-backed rebels who occupy Sanaa and run unrecognised government

Yemeni government: Exiled government in Aden led by eight-member Presidential Leadership Council

Southern Transitional Council: Faction in Yemeni government that seeks autonomy for the south

Habrish 'rebels': Tribal-backed forces feuding with STC over control of oil in government territory

The National Archives, Abu Dhabi

Founded over 50 years ago, the National Archives collects valuable historical material relating to the UAE, and is the oldest and richest archive relating to the Arabian Gulf.

Much of the material can be viewed on line at the Arabian Gulf Digital Archive - https://www.agda.ae/en

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UAE currency: the story behind the money in your pockets
The alternatives

• Founded in 2014, Telr is a payment aggregator and gateway with an office in Silicon Oasis. It’s e-commerce entry plan costs Dh349 monthly (plus VAT). QR codes direct customers to an online payment page and merchants can generate payments through messaging apps.

• Business Bay’s Pallapay claims 40,000-plus active merchants who can invoice customers and receive payment by card. Fees range from 1.99 per cent plus Dh1 per transaction depending on payment method and location, such as online or via UAE mobile.

• Tap started in May 2013 in Kuwait, allowing Middle East businesses to bill, accept, receive and make payments online “easier, faster and smoother” via goSell and goCollect. It supports more than 10,000 merchants. Monthly fees range from US$65-100, plus card charges of 2.75-3.75 per cent and Dh1.2 per sale.

• 2checkout’s “all-in-one payment gateway and merchant account” accepts payments in 200-plus markets for 2.4-3.9 per cent, plus a Dh1.2-Dh1.8 currency conversion charge. The US provider processes online shop and mobile transactions and has 17,000-plus active digital commerce users.

• PayPal is probably the best-known online goods payment method - usually used for eBay purchases -  but can be used to receive funds, providing everyone’s signed up. Costs from 2.9 per cent plus Dh1.2 per transaction.

Mercer, the investment consulting arm of US services company Marsh & McLennan, expects its wealth division to at least double its assets under management (AUM) in the Middle East as wealth in the region continues to grow despite economic headwinds, a company official said.

Mercer Wealth, which globally has $160 billion in AUM, plans to boost its AUM in the region to $2-$3bn in the next 2-3 years from the present $1bn, said Yasir AbuShaban, a Dubai-based principal with Mercer Wealth.

“Within the next two to three years, we are looking at reaching $2 to $3 billion as a conservative estimate and we do see an opportunity to do so,” said Mr AbuShaban.

Mercer does not directly make investments, but allocates clients’ money they have discretion to, to professional asset managers. They also provide advice to clients.

“We have buying power. We can negotiate on their (client’s) behalf with asset managers to provide them lower fees than they otherwise would have to get on their own,” he added.

Mercer Wealth’s clients include sovereign wealth funds, family offices, and insurance companies among others.

From its office in Dubai, Mercer also looks after Africa, India and Turkey, where they also see opportunity for growth.

Wealth creation in Middle East and Africa (MEA) grew 8.5 per cent to $8.1 trillion last year from $7.5tn in 2015, higher than last year’s global average of 6 per cent and the second-highest growth in a region after Asia-Pacific which grew 9.9 per cent, according to consultancy Boston Consulting Group (BCG). In the region, where wealth grew just 1.9 per cent in 2015 compared with 2014, a pickup in oil prices has helped in wealth generation.

BCG is forecasting MEA wealth will rise to $12tn by 2021, growing at an annual average of 8 per cent.

Drivers of wealth generation in the region will be split evenly between new wealth creation and growth of performance of existing assets, according to BCG.

Another general trend in the region is clients’ looking for a comprehensive approach to investing, according to Mr AbuShaban.

“Institutional investors or some of the families are seeing a slowdown in the available capital they have to invest and in that sense they are looking at optimizing the way they manage their portfolios and making sure they are not investing haphazardly and different parts of their investment are working together,” said Mr AbuShaban.

Some clients also have a higher appetite for risk, given the low interest-rate environment that does not provide enough yield for some institutional investors. These clients are keen to invest in illiquid assets, such as private equity and infrastructure.

“What we have seen is a desire for higher returns in what has been a low-return environment specifically in various fixed income or bonds,” he said.

“In this environment, we have seen a de facto increase in the risk that clients are taking in things like illiquid investments, private equity investments, infrastructure and private debt, those kind of investments were higher illiquidity results in incrementally higher returns.”

The Abu Dhabi Investment Authority, one of the largest sovereign wealth funds, said in its 2016 report that has gradually increased its exposure in direct private equity and private credit transactions, mainly in Asian markets and especially in China and India. The authority’s private equity department focused on structured equities owing to “their defensive characteristics.”

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Women:

1. Rhiannan Iffland (AUS) 322.95 points
2. Lysanne Richard (CAN) 285.75
3. Ellie Smart (USA) 277.70

Men:

1. Gary Hunt (GBR) 431.55
2. Constantin Popovici (ROU) 424.65
3. Oleksiy Prygorov (UKR) 392.30

While you're here
While you're here
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Islamophobia definition

A widely accepted definition was made by the All Party Parliamentary Group on British Muslims in 2019: “Islamophobia is rooted in racism and is a type of racism that targets expressions of Muslimness or perceived Muslimness.” It further defines it as “inciting hatred or violence against Muslims”.

Conservative MPs who have publicly revealed sending letters of no confidence
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  2. Peter Bone
  3. Ben Bradley
  4. Andrew Bridgen
  5. Maria Caulfield​​​​​​​
  6. Simon Clarke 
  7. Philip Davies
  8. Nadine Dorries​​​​​​​
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  10. Mark Francois 
  11. Chris Green
  12. Adam Holloway
  13. Andrea Jenkyns
  14. Anne-Marie Morris
  15. Sheryll Murray
  16. Jacob Rees-Mogg
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Cast: Loujain Adada, Zeina Khoury, Farhana Bodi, Ebraheem Al Samadi, Mona Kattan, and couples Safa & Fahad Siddiqui and DJ Bliss & Danya Mohammed 

Rating: 1/5

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Updated: November 23, 2023, 8:53 AM
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