Dubai prepares for the next step

Despite reorganisations for Dubai World, Nakheel and Dubai Holding, the emirate's debt problems are not yet over. Now the spotlight has turned to Investment Corporation of Dubai, which brings its own challenges.

The reverberations of the global financial crisis continue to echo around Dubai.

Dubai World is restructured, although the final deals for it and its subsidiary Nakheel have still not been signed, and a phased reorganisation of Dubai Holding's financial obligations is under way.

Now attention is turning to Investment Corporation of Dubai (ICD), the third pillar of the corporate infrastructure known informally as Dubai Inc.

Analysts regard ICD as the most solid of the emirate's government-related holding companies, backed by valuable cash-generating assets such as Emirates Airline, Dubai Aluminium and the Dubai World Trade Centre.

But with a substantial presence in property and the financial sector, it still has a significant amount of debt on its books and faces some maturities this year and next. Some experts believe ICD will have no alternative but to seek to renegotiate the terms of its debts with bankers.

"We expect ICD to roll over the debt to extend the maturities to 2014 and beyond," Mohammed Hawa, a research analyst at Credit Suisse, said in a recent review.

Martin Kohlhase, the Middle East corporate finance analyst at the ratings agency Moody's Investors Service, says: "I wouldn't be surprised if they were talking to creditors. We've seen some Dubai Holding debt rolled over and I can see ICD embarking on a similar strategy."

However, ICD faces some challenges as it seeks a new deal from its bankers. Group level debts amount to US$6 billion (Dh22.03bn), with $4bn due for repayment in May and the balance two years later.

It is unlikely that even ICD's cash generators, which themselves have significant financial commitments, will be able to produce enough money to meet those deadlines.

Zafar Nazim, the London-based analyst at the US investment bank JPMorgan, sums up the dilemma ICD faces.

"Investors are now used to seeing debt getting restructured in Dubai," Mr Nazim says. "This is different, though. ICD is a blue-chip company with solid assets. However, there is scarce information on their ability to repay the $4bn debt due this year.

"After Dubai World, banks probably have less appetite for lending to holding companies, as this moves the lenders further from the cash-generating assets."

Bankers, who asked to remain anonymous, say there is also a legacy from the original $6bn loan. The facility was syndicated in 2008 and comprises $3.75bn of conventional and $2.25bn in Islamic debt.

"It was not a happy syndication," says one financier. "It was almost a standby facility, which the banks really didn't want ICD to use."

But some of the facility was used by ICD to support a syndicated loan by one of the companies under its umbrella, Borse Dubai, the holding company for the emirate's stock exchanges.

In February 2009, Borse Dubai raised $2.5bn (mostly to repay existing debts) but only $1.2bn came from international banks, with the balance from ICD's $6bn "overdraft".

It is unclear how much, if any, of the facility was not used.

Once group level debts are taken care of, there are other significant liabilities cascading down the loose holding structure of ICD.

Borse Dubai's $2.5bn of debt, rolled over last year but due for repayment next month, has been effectively restructured through a partial repayment from the proceeds of the sale of some of its shares in Nasdaq OMX last year, as well as a further loan and extension until 2014.

There are other assets, with concomitant liabilities, in the ICD structure. Overall, the group and its subsidiaries or affiliates owe a total of $24bn, Credit Suisse estimates, but this is backed by nearly $30bn of assets - enough cover to reassure most creditors.

Some are more solid than others, however. The jewel in the crown is Emirates Airline, among Dubai's most successful companies and a world leader in aviation, on which Credit Suisse puts an equity value of $11.3bn. But Emirates also has a total of $1.6bn of debt to be repaid this year and next, the bank estimates.

Similarly, Emirates NBD, in which ICD has a 56 per cent stake, is the biggest bank by assets in the UAE and was intended to be a "national champion" in the financial industry. But it also faces a significant repayment schedule this year and next, when a $3.4bn sukuk matures in two stages.

Other banks in which ICD has an interest, such as Dubai Islamic Bank, Commercial Bank of Dubai and Union National Bank, are likely to have suffered through their significant exposure to the property market. ICD also has a 31 per cent holding in Emaar, the emirate's leading property developer.

Dubai Aluminium has a net book value of $4.3bn, as stated in a recent Dubai Government bond prospectus, and could be a source of instant funds for ICD if it bites the bullet of asset sales as part of its restructuring plans.

It is doubtful the cash flow generated from dividends of these and other successful operating companies will be sufficient to satisfy both the Government, which relies on ICD for a substantial part of its budget, and the financiers who want their loans repaid, while keeping enough capital for future investment.

A banker summed up ICD's position like this: "After Dubai World, the banks will not want to restructure holding company debt without some kind of additional security, like an equity interest in the operating companies or some kind of guarantee from the Government.

"Can ICD provide them with enough information and reassurance to persuade them that a roll-over makes financial sense?"