As two-week periods go, the last 13 days have been pretty good for Nico Rosberg, and they got even better on Sunday after he dominated the German Grand Prix to win his home race for the first time.
On a day of home celebrations, Rosberg cruised to an accomplished victory for Mercedes to increase his lead over teammate Lewis Hamilton to 14 points.
Rosberg's win, which was also his first podium appearance at a German race, came after a week in which he married long-time girlfriend Vivian Sibold, claimed the pole position, signed an extended contract with Mercedes and celebrated Germany's Fifa World Cup victory.
“It’s fantastic,” Rosberg said. “It’s an amazing feeling to win at home. It’s a very special day. This weekend with pole and the win is awesome. I didn’t expect such a big advantage in the race.”
While it was Rosberg who took centre stage, he rarely featured in the coverage at Hockenheim – the other 21 drivers on the grid, like the viewers, hardly saw him, apart from the start and finish.
The real entertainment was watching the Mercedes-GP car of Lewis Hamilton stage another great escape as he turned 20th place on the grid into a third-place finish, just 1.8 seconds adrift of the Williams of Valtteri Bottas, who finished runner-up for the second successive race.
The Briton cut his way through the field and survived making contact with the Sauber of Adrian Sutil, Kimi Raikkonen’s Ferrari and Jenson Button’s McLaren-Mercedes to minimise his points loss to Rosberg to just 10 points as he fell 14 points adrift of his teammate with nine races remaining.
Rosberg rarely featured on the TV screens as he cruised at the front, the television director occasionally cutting back to him as he overtook a backmarker.
Once he claimed a lead of 10 seconds in the opening laps over Bottas, he seemed in control, although he suffered a scare when there was a safety-car period after Sutil spun and stalled his Sauber on the start-finish straight on Lap 47.
Marshals were able to eventually wheel the car off the track, but the car sat dangerously close to the racing line for several laps, and Rosberg acknowledged he feared his afternoon was about to get more complicated.
“I definitely got a bit worried when I saw Sutil out there, as I thought it would be a safety car,” he said.
“That would have made it more difficult. But it was a great finish for me in the end.”
The race had a feel of 2013 about it, with high tyre wear on the track and many in the field having to make three stops for changes, though both Rosberg and Bottas were able to get through on just two trips to the pit area.
Hamilton intended to get through on two, but he chose mid-race to move to three as he struggled with tyre conversation and minor front wing damage caused by a collision with Button. He completed several fine passing moves, most done with late braking at the tight right-hander at Turn 6.
His job was made even harder as a result of brake failure that caused him to crash in qualifying, and he had fallen a further five places as a result of the penalty received for changing his gearbox following the heavy impact of Saturday's accident.
“I had great fun,” the 2008 world champion said. “I did as good as I could.
“It was hard to get through the pack safely and I had a little bit of a collision with Jenson.
“I thought he [Rosberg] was going to open the door, which he has done a couple of times lately, but that was my bad judgement. It was hard to overtake, so I’m glad to get some points today.”
Bottas conserved his tyres well during the final stint to successfully hold off Hamilton, and the Finn said: “I feel really happy again, being third time in a row on the podium. These guys [Mercedes] were too quick today, but I’m really happy that we at least managed to keep one of them behind.”
Sebastian Vettel was fourth for Red Bull Racing, with the world champion coming home just ahead of Ferrari's Fernando Alonso, who survived a wheel-to-wheel tussle with the Red Bull of Daniel Ricciardo.
Nico Hulkenberg was the third German in the top 10, finishing seventh in his Force India, ahead of Button, with the second McLaren of Kevin Magnussen and the second Force India of Sergio Perez completing the points-scoring positions.
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The total rose to 254,000 in the year to June 2021, followed by steep jumps to 634,000 in the year to June 2022 and 906,000 in the year to June 2023.
The latest available figure of 728,000 for the 12 months to June 2024 suggests levels are starting to decrease.
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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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