Shoppers stand in a checkout line during Black Friday sales at store in California. David McNew / Reuters
Shoppers stand in a checkout line during Black Friday sales at store in California. David McNew / Reuters

Opinion

Black Friday deals?

The annual American shopping festival is fast becoming part of the global calendar

National Editorial

26 November, 2016

The once uniquely American tradition of Black Friday is now a bona fide global event. After the holiday of Thanksgiving – celebrated on the final Thursday of November – Americans venture out to shops and malls eager to take advantage of special deals. In recent years, many Americans have been doing their shopping online, which has seen the emergence of a new event dubbed Cyber Monday.

Closer to home, many of our shops have joined the festivities with their own Black Friday deals. And last week, The National reported that the online mega-retailer Amazon.com was exploring a bid to purchase souq.com for Dh3.67 billion. Such a purchase would herald a new era in online shopping in the Middle East. It would also cement the trend of Black Friday and Cyber Monday shopping events in this region.

Whether or not we understand the history of Black Friday, it is clear that the global commerce space has consolidated so much that we all can grab a bargain. This is great news for shoppers.

WHAT MACRO FACTORS ARE IMPACTING META TECH MARKETS?

• Looming global slowdown and recession in key economies

• Russia-Ukraine war

• Interest rate hikes and the rising cost of debt servicing

• Oil price volatility

• Persisting inflationary pressures

• Exchange rate fluctuations

• Shortage of labour/skills

• A resurgence of Covid?

A MAN FROM MOTIHARI

Author: Abdullah Khan
Publisher: Penguin Random House
Pages: 304
Available: Now

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6pm: Al Maktoum Challenge Round 1 – Group 1 (PA) $50,000 (Dirt) 1,600m
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Dubai works towards better air quality by 2021

Dubai is on a mission to record good air quality for 90 per cent of the year – up from 86 per cent annually today – by 2021.

The municipality plans to have seven mobile air-monitoring stations by 2020 to capture more accurate data in hourly and daily trends of pollution.

These will be on the Palm Jumeirah, Al Qusais, Muhaisnah, Rashidiyah, Al Wasl, Al Quoz and Dubai Investment Park.

“It will allow real-time responding for emergency cases,” said Khaldoon Al Daraji, first environment safety officer at the municipality.

“We’re in a good position except for the cases that are out of our hands, such as sandstorms.

“Sandstorms are our main concern because the UAE is just a receiver.

“The hotspots are Iran, Saudi Arabia and southern Iraq, but we’re working hard with the region to reduce the cycle of sandstorm generation.”

Mr Al Daraji said monitoring as it stood covered 47 per cent of Dubai.

There are 12 fixed stations in the emirate, but Dubai also receives information from monitors belonging to other entities.

“There are 25 stations in total,” Mr Al Daraji said.

“We added new technology and equipment used for the first time for the detection of heavy metals.

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