Oqyana Group - KD72.6 Million Loss for Fiscal 2009

AlQabas reported on Oqyana's annual general shareholders meeting which was held at the Ministry of Commerce and Industry.  As you might guess from the latter statement, that's not a particularly favorable development.  The MOCI doesn't rent out space for meetings.  When a company has a shareholders meeting there, it's because the Ministry has instructed the company to hold one so that it can convey  information directly to the shareholders, usually to advise them of regulatory and other violations  by the company.  These days the MOCI seems to be holding a lot of such meetings.

AlQ mentions two of the comments made by the Ministry:  the Company's financials were delayed.  And it had not registered a piece of property it owns in Bahrain in its own name. Oqyana's Chairman, Nabil Jafar Abdul Rahim noted that the delay was because of the delay in Stehwaz preparing its financials and Oqyana holds 100 million shares in Stehwaz (!).  As to the second comment, he noted that the Company had set up a 100% owned Bahraini subsidiary to hold the real estate.

The Chairman also commented that the primary cause of the Company's loss of KD72.6 million for 2009  versus a gain of KD98 million the year earlier was the revaluation of assets.  Or perhaps more precisely devaluation of assets.  Shareholders' equity stood at KD369 million at FYE09 versus KD429 million the year earlier.  Total assets were down from KD493 million to KD438 million.  

Oqyana holds both Stehwaz and The Investment Dar shares in its investment portfolio.   What value they are being carried by Oqyana is not clear.  If you're not aware, all three companies can be considered distinguished business partners and members of The Investment Dar Group.

Abdul Rahim also noted that Nakheel had given the Company a two year extension to develop its property in Dubai.  Originally the property was to have been developed within 42 months ending in 2009.  Oqyana was unable to secure the necessary financing.  So the extension.  It's unclear  but presumably it's two years from 2009.   Recently, it's been knocking on the doors of local and other banks looking for between US$50 million to US$100 million in loans to move forward.  But it has had no success so far.   

As I'm sure The Real Nick can confirm, a real estate development company without access to loans is in dire straits.  Sort of the equivalent of "The Donald" losing his ego.

On the subject of financing, the Chairman noted that the Company had obtained a loan from a bank in Bahrain against shares of Stehwaz.   This apparently dates from more than a few years back given that Stehwaz has been in rather distressed conditions for some years now.

A new board was elected consisting of Mr. Nabil Jafar Abdul Rahim and representatives of TID, Safwat Real Estate, Efad Real Estate (also affiliated as a business partner with TID), and Adeem.  

If you're not familiar with Adeem, you can link here to "The Navy Seals" of the Investment World!  You can also use the tags "Adeem", "Stehwaz" and "The Investment Dar" to find earlier posts on those entities if you're interested.

Adeem Investment Company - The Work Goes On (and On and On)

The work goes on, the cause endures, the hope still lives, and the dream shall never die.

Since last November.   From the time this is taking, this is indeed a monumental project.  And AIC is working quietly, I can't find a news report at all about them.

Anyone "up North" who can shed some light?

Adeem v Gulf Finance House: Comeback "Win" for GFH

Today the race is finally over.  

While the IT Team at Adeem Investments put up an  incredible fight, at the last moment the GFH Team lapped them.

Yes, in less than 115 days, GFH updated its website for several S&P rating downgrades and one upgrade.

Many commentators out there, including Abu Arqala, credit GFH will an innovative strategy which literally helped them lap Adeem several times.  Instead of going through each of S&P's downgrades and its one upgrade in sequence, GFH jumped to the last ratings action (an upgrade from SD to CCC-).

It's that sort of bold decisive action that has earned GFH the well deserved name it has in the market as well as reconfirming yet again (as if that were really needed) the validity of their business model and the unshakable faith and support of the market ....

This blog tried to contact the Adeem Team to get their reactions to this dramatic defeat, but since their website is still being upgraded to serve all of us better, sadly we were unable to make contact.

Adeem Investment Company - Significant Progress Made

As you know, we at Suq Al Mal have been closely following progress over at AIC on its project to complete "their unscheduled maintenance to upgrade our systems to better serve you".

Significant progress has been made since we first noticed this effort was underway 18 November.

Since then, we've learned that Adeem's crack IT Team is a a virtual F-1 race with GFH to see who will get their corporate website fixed first.

Gulf Finance House are laboring day and night to update GFH's ratings page on their website.  As you probably know, they have yet to reflect the November 2009 downgrade by S&P.

While many think that AIC has an insurmountable lead because they started first and because S&P has downgraded GFH multiple times since that first November downgrade, I'm not yet ready to count out the GFH Team.

The heart of the Gulf is racing!  And we here at SAM are calling the "play by plays" as they occur.

Stay tuned.  It looks like this race is going to be down to the wire.  Por una cabeza as the saying goes.

Adeem Investment Company - The Work Continues

Copyright Ricardo Liberato Used Under Creative Commons License

It's not a suprise that a big project takes a long time to accomplish. But it's going to really be something when it's done.

Earlier posts here and here and here.

Adeem Investment Company - The Work Continues

Boston Harbour Tunnel watch out, Adeem Investments is gaining on you.  Or for those with a taste for more local references - the street project in central Sana'a.

Yes, AIC's webmaster is still hard at work to better serve you.

Adeem Investments Kuwait - Still Hard at Work

Still hard at work improving the website in order to "better serve you".

Since at least 18 November.

It's quite a task apparently.  But well worth the wait, I'm sure.

Investment Dar Bank Website Now Password Protected - Adeem Investment Company Website Down for Maintenance/Upgrade

From time to time I like to follow up on my earlier posts to see if there have been any developments. 

So I decided to check today to see if indeed Mustafa Ibrahim AlSalih had resigned his board directorships at Investment Dar Bank Bahrain and Adeem Investment Company Kuwait as had been rumored in AlQabas, a Kuwait newspaper.  For the record:  I have seen no further news confirming that press account.  One would expect that both websites would note the resignation of a board member as significant news.

Investment Dar Bank's website is now password protected.  And the previous link on The Investment Dar Kuwait's website has been removed.  The links to TID's other two banks:  Bahrain Islamic and Boubyan are, however, still there.

In an interesting coincidence Adeem Investment Company's website is also down for unscheduled maintenance so they can upgrade their systems to improve service.  

Hawkamah Corporate Governance Conference - Important Documents Released

Hawkamah held its Fourth Annual Conference "Building Middle East Markets and Corporate Governance Imperatives" the 9th and 10th at the DIFC, Dubai.   Event was in partnership with the OECD.

As usual, a worthwhile event.

Two solid documents issued:

1. Policy Brief on Improving Corporate Governance of Banks in the Middle East and North Africa Region
   
2. Study on Insolvency Systems in the Middle East and North Africa   

The Study covers 11 jurisdictions:

DIFC, Egypt, Jordan, Kuwait, Lebanon, Oman, Palestine, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, UAE and Yemen.

There are some global comparables on recovery rates (Page 5) based on another study the World Bank "Doing Business 2009".

As you might expect, the MENA region has lower claim recovery rates than other major countries.  Japan at 92.5% , the OECD at 68.6% versus MENA at 29.99%.  Bahrain came in with a respectable 63.2%

Anyway:  A hat tip to Hawkamah.  More evidence of  regional institutions helping develop the GCC/MENA market.

Rumors of Resignation of Vice Chairman of Adeem Investment Company Kuwait - Link to The Investment Dar Restructuring Saga?

There is an unconfirmed rumor that Mustafa Ibrahim AlSalih, Vice Chairman / Managing Director of Adeem Investment Company Kuwait and a Board Member of Investment Dar Bank Bahrain  ("IDBB"), an "Islamic" investment bank, has resigned due to differences over strategy.

The Investment Dar Company Kuwait, also an "Islamic" investment bank,  ("TID") is the major shareholder in IDBB.   TID and Adeem have partnered in some investments including the purchase of Austin Martin.

The rumor is that Mustafa objected to certain actions TID proposed to take at Investment Dar Bahrain.  Since major shareholders generally get their way, a director opposed to the majority's wish might resign if he felt strongly enough. 

One article also unconfirmed and therefore a rumor suggests a possible reason he might have felt the need to resign.  Another from a TID press release may also indicate possible areas of conflict between TID and IDBB. See the third paragraph.

What's less clear is why he would resign from Adeem as well.  Perhaps Adeem is supporting TID's proposal at IDBB?  Or it may be something else.

What makes this story worthy of note is that TID is the midst of the very difficult debt restructuring of  KD1 billion (US$3.5 billion) of its own liabilities.

That suggests a post on TID would be timely.  And, perhaps, one on Global Kuwait, another major Kuwaiti investment firm in the midst of a debt restructuring.

Given the TID link,  more news is likely to come on this story.

Stay tuned.

And, finally, while it should be clear from the above, it's important to note that I am merely commenting on rumors rather than vouching for their accuracy.