The World's Richest Arabs

As extraordinary oil revenue surpluses in the Gulf states are fed back into European investments at a prodigious rate, Fredrik Richter and James Exelby report on the Middle East’s major players

Money, Money, Money was Europe’s number one, Abba was Sweden’s second-biggest export and the economies of the industrialised world were groaning under the burden of record oil prices. Exactly 30 years later, one group of people is again doing rather well out of the situation – and it’s not Abba.

According to the Institute of International Finance, between 2004 and 2006 the member states of the Gulf Cooperation Council – Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, the United Arab Emirates (UAE), Qatar, Bahrain and Oman – recorded a combined current account surplus of €369bn. The IMF estimates that only a quarter of recent oil revenues have been converted into official reserves. The question then is: where are they putting the money?

Back in the 1970s, Europe was often the high-rolling sheikh’s first port of call. Real estate in London and Paris boomed, and the casinos of the Cote D’Azur made a killing. The late King Fahd of Saudi Arabia, while still a prince, led by example, losing a reported $6m in one night at the tables in Monte Carlo. With local financial institutions barely in existence, US Treasury bills and Western banks hoovered up much of the rest. Sometimes, it seemed, infrastructure back home got built with whatever was left over.

This time around, the picture is a little more complicated. After 9/11, many Arab tourists have preferred to avoid the West and its perceived anti-Muslim sentiment, opting for Cairo, Dubai and – until the recent troubles, at least – Lebanon.

Europe is still an important destination for investment funds, however. The Bahrain-based Arcapita fund, backed by Saudi, Kuwaiti and Qatari investors, has directed a third of its worldwide investments to Europe, putting the value of its financial and equity transactions in Europe at around €7bn over the past 10 years.

“Our assets in Europe balance our worldwide investments,” says Arcapita CEO Atif Abdulmalik. “They offer our investors a different combination of risk and return than they might find in less mature markets.”

Josh Mandel, head of business intelligence at the Control Risk Group, who advises Middle Eastern investors in the run-up to acquisitions around the world, agrees.

“More conservative Middle Eastern investors are focusing on blue chips in Europe and the US, but even less conservative funds still maintain large shares of their portfolios in European assets,” he says.

The Arcapita fund now owns, among others, Viridian Group, a Northern Irish electricity utility, and South Staffordshire Water PLC, a UK-based water utility firm.

“These utility companies in particular offer consistent and reliable returns,” says Abdulmalik. “This is much appreciated by GCC investors after the recent volatility of regional stock exchanges.” At the beginning of 2006, Middle Eastern stock exchanges suffered the consequences of the irrational exuberance of too much money chasing too few assets. The Saudi stock exchange lost €265bn of its market capitalization in just three months, further increasing incentives to invest oil money abroad.

In past oil booms, the appearance of super-rich Arab individuals made all the headlines. One of the first big-name players was Adnan Khashoggi, playboy arms dealer and reputedly the world’s wealthiest private individual, whose name still appears on a recent Arab-world top 40 rich list. Another was Mahdi al-Tajir, a former ambassador of the UAE in London and the right-hand man of the late ruler of Dubai, Sheikh Rashid bin Saeed Al Maktoum.

Later, Prince Alwaleed bin Talal of Saudi Arabia emerged on the scene, his first big move being an equity investment in Citibank in 1990. Alwaleed continues to be one of the world’s most prominent investors, holding stakes in blue chip banking, media, hotels, real estate and technology companies in Europe, the US and China. Recently, he formed an alliance with the world’s richest man, Bill Gates, to buy the Four Seasons Hotels group.

Surprisingly, Alwaleed is the only member of the House of Saud who appears in the previously mentioned league table.

Today, however, it is the investment funds – both private and government-owned – that are making much of the running. Ironically, some of the boldest deals have been signed by the emirate with the least oil. Dubai International Capital (DIC) holds a 3% stake in DaimlerChrysler (for which it paid around €750m inOctober 2004) and has acquired the Tussauds Group (of which it has since sold 80%), industrial manufacturer Doncasters and the Travelodge hotel chain in the UK. Its portfolio of assets is now estimated at €3.8bn, and its global partners include private equity giants Carlyle and KKR.

Other funds such as the Abu Dhabi Investment Authority (ADIA), gas-rich Qatar’s Qatar Investment Authority (QIA), the Kuwait Investment Authority (KIA) and the Saudi Arabian Monetary Authority (SAMA) are much larger, but also much more secretive. Estimates for the value of assets managed by the ADIA, for example, range between an extremely conservative €190bn up to a more probable €380bn.

Saudi money is believed to be behind many of the deals involving the boom in private equity and companies like Carlyle, Blackstone, KKR and Texas Pacific. The latest private equity mega-deal – at €34bn, a new record – involves KKR, Texas Pacific and Goldman Sachs and has targeted Texas’s top power company, TXU.

As befitting the emirate that has become the UK’s number one long-haul tourist destination through a combination of clever marketing and world-class facilities, other Dubai government-owned entities have been active in headline-grabbing foreign acquisitions – although things have not always gone smoothly. While DIC’s bid for Liverpool Football Club foundered on price rather than fan sentiment, fellow government-owned entity Dubai Ports was forced to sell the US operations of P&O Ports after opposition in Congress. Much was made of the fact that the UAE had been one of only three countries to recognise the Taliban regime in Afghanistan (the other two were Saudi Arabia and Pakistan).

Europe and the UK in particular appear to take a more tolerant attitude than the US.

“The sale of P&O Ports to Dubai Ports became a highly political issue in the US, but not in Europe,” points out Mandel.

Abdulmalik says that his fund has not encountered any problems with being a Middle Eastern fund investing in Europe. “There has been Arab investment in Europe for a long period of time, even though it moved into private equity only recently. Arcapita is not affiliated with any political or religious groups, and we are perceived as an international investor with a track record of responsible stewardship of private equity assets,” he explains.

That said, the recent interest expressed by both DIC and the QIA in buying a large stake in EADS, the European aviation group that includes aircraft maker Airbus, may face political hurdles. The flag carriers of both Qatar and Dubai, respectively Qatar Airways and Emirates, are major customers of Airbus and have significant orders for the A380 superjumbo, delays in the production of which are causing a great deal of pain to the parent company. EADS is also at the heart of the European defence industry, and the Gulf states are some of the world’s biggest arms buyers.

IMF data, however, suggests that while the flow into US treasuries has decreased, significant sums are still making their way into the US, but on a new route. The focus is likely to remain on the UK and the US for the simple reason that few other markets possess the liquidity to absorb the levels of cash flow that these funds have at hand.

There are Arab investors who are not oil-backed. In Europe’s largest leveraged buyout ever, Egyptian billionaire Naguib Sawiris acquired Italian telecom operator Wind via his investment vehicle Weather Investment in a transaction valued at over €12bn. Sawiris is CEO of Orascom Telecom Holding, which operates mobile networks in six emerging markets in the Middle East and Asia. In February this year, Weather Investments again targeted Europe with a €3.4bn bid for Greek operator TIM Hellas.

The Sawiris family is diversified. In 2006, Naguib’s brother Samih, head of property developer Orascom Hotels & Development, bought land in the Swiss mountain village of Andermatt, where he intends to develop a world-class tourism destination. He not only successfully won the trust of the locals but also received an exemption from Switzerland’s property laws, which forbid foreigners to own land.

Prince Alwaleed bin Talal al Saud
Saudi Arabia
€21.2bn (last year: €19.7bn)

“I speak, first of all, as a Saudi citizen, then as a businessman, then as a member of the Saudi Royal Family.” Thus is quoted one of the world’s most prominent investors in his glowing official biography by former BBC and CNN anchor and current Al Jazeera International frontman Riz Khan. The book, accompanied by a free DVD, is published by Harper Collins, part of News Corp – of which, incidentally, Alwaleed owns 6%.

Almost everyone tends to take the prince at his word. According to the story, Alwaleed – son of the Saudi royal family’s “rebel prince” – and the daughter of Lebanon’s first prime minister started out in the early 1980s with a house and a $30,000 loan from his father. After making a fortune in the Saudi construction sector, Alwaleed hit the big time when he bought into struggling Citibank in 1990. He invested $209m for a 4.9% stake, the biggest holding allowed without being legally required to reveal his identity. His subsequent attempt to increase his holding to 14.9%, however, was blocked by the Federal Reserve. The Fed has never commented on the decision.

Now his interests are global, spanning the Middle East, Asia, Africa, Europe and the US in the media, technology, banking, hotels, real estate and agriculture sectors. He owns Paris’s leading hotel, the George V, as well as 100,000 hectares of reclaimed desert in Egypt – this is greater than the surface area of 13 of the world’s sovereign states. In 2006, his flagship investment vehicle Kingdom Holdings attempted to instil confidence in the domestic Saudi stock market by buying into local blue chips.

Alwaleed’s large shareholdings in Western media companies (Time Warner is another part of his portfolio) might raise concerns if he were seen as a proxy for Saudi petrodollars, but he has escaped suspicion. Alwaleed is also a big backer of the Carter Center, established by former US president Jimmy Carter, whose interventions in the Middle East in recent months have been somewhat controversial.

The Hariri family
Lebanon/Saudi Arabia
€12.9bn (last year: €4.1bn)

On 14 February, 2005, former Lebanese prime minister Rafiq Hariri died as so many of Lebanon’s leaders in the last 30 years have died: in an act of violence by persons unknown. His vast estate is now officially divided between his family, creating in the process the world’s youngest billionaire (his daughter Hind).

Hariri, so the story goes, was a self-made tycoon who grew rich in the Saudi Arabian construction boom of the late 1970s and had close connections with the Kingdom’s late King Fahd. His flagship construction firm was Saudi Oger. He returned to his homeland, having also acquired Saudi citizenship, after the end of the Lebanese Civil War in 1991, and became prime minister.

At that point he became a virtual one-man nation rebuilder. He was the instigator of the reconstruction of downtown Beirut and the largest shareholder in its developer/owner Solidere. He owned one of the country’s biggest banks, Banque de la Méditerranée (now BankMed). He had extensive declared interests in telecoms, security guard firms, media (Future TV and later Al Mostaqbal newspaper) and a chain of luxury restaurants, allegedly along with numerous other undeclared investments. The Hariri Foundation handed out thousands of scholarships to young Lebanese people, mostly for study in the US. Hariri appointed his private banker, Riad Salameh, formerly of Merrill Lynch, to be governor of the Central Bank of Lebanon (Salameh still holds the position in 2007).

More recently there were investments in Jordan, with a €285m stake in Arab Bank, and real estate purchases reportedly making Hariri the country’s biggest landlord, including the €455m Saraya luxury development. In 2006, Arab Bank (50%) and BankMed (41%) moved jointly to take a 91% stake in Turkey’s MNG Bank.

Hariri also owned shares in French financial institutions – French president Jacques Chirac counted him a personal friend – and two million ft2 of prime real estate in Houston, Texas.

Nasser Al Kharafi
Kuwait
€10.6bn (last year: €7.1bn)

Having started out with a construction firm, the National Company for Mechanical and Electrical Works, Nasser al Kharafitoday heads a multi-billion-dollar conglomerate. Via a 30% stake in Atheer Telecom, he participates in a lucrative mobile operation in southern Iraq. He is also a major shareholder in and director of the National Bank of Kuwait.

The KharafiGroup has few investments in Europe but is one of the largest foreign investors in Albania, where it has substantial influence. As well as two luxury hotels and other real estate, it also owns Albanian Airlines, which flies to destinations in Italy, Germany, Greece, Turkey and Kosovo.

The group has invested heavily elsewhere in the Middle East, particularly in Egypt, where it has been active for more than 50 years. With over €2bn in investments in the country, the KharafiGroup owns the ubiquitous Americana chain of fast food outlets (KFC, Pizza Hut, Hardee’s) and has recently built Marsa Alam International Airport and the nearby 13,000-room, 8 million m2 Red Sea resort community of Port Ghalib.

The Bin Laden family
Saudi Arabia
€5.4bn (last year: €5.2bn)

A share in the Bin Laden family’s construction fortune provided its outlaw son with the means to set up Al Qaeda. The Bin Laden Group continues to be one of the busiest builders in the Gulf’s booming markets; with 35,000 employees, the Jeddah-based company is currently involved in construction of the €19.6bn King Abdullah Economic City in Saudi Arabia. The family’s interests outside the Gulf are unknown.

Mohammad Amoudi
Ethiopia
€5.3bn (last year: €1.9bn)

Mohammed Amoudi was born in Ethiopia of a Yemeni father and an Ethiopian mother but grew up in Saudi Arabia. Another of the Saudi construction boom billionaires, he later bought up oil refineries in Morocco and Sweden, where he is one of the country’s biggest foreign investors. He is also Ethiopia’s largest private employer, with a payroll of 30,000, and has business interests in the UK and the US.

The Olayan family
Saudi Arabia
€5.2bn (last year: €5.1bn)

The trucking company founded in 1947 by Suliman Olayan (pictured), who died in 2002, has developed into a multi-billion-dollar conglomerate with interests in the Middle East, Europe and the US. Olayan Group, together with car manufacturer VW and Abu Dhabi government investment fund Mubadala, owns LeasePlan, a leading vehicle management and leasing provider. It also holds a 26% stake in Peel Holdings, a leading UK property developer, which in turn owns Liverpool’s John Lennon Airport, the Trafford Centre shopping complex, the Manchester Ship Canal, Glasgow Harbour and the Mersey Docks. A subsidiary, Crescent Holdings, headquartered in Vienna with a branch in Athens, says it is currently exploring investment opportunities in eastern Europe.

In the Middle East, Olayan Financing Company has founded the €150m-strong investment firm Oasis Capital, together with Majid Al Futtaim Holding and Orascom Telecom. Olayan has a 30% stake in the company. Hutham Olayan, president and CEO of the Olayan America Corporation, sits on the board of Morgan Stanley and was named by Time as the 35th most influential woman in international (non-US) business.

The Sawiris family
Egypt
€3.9bn (last year: €2.6bn)

The three Sawiris brothers – Naguib, Samih and Nassef – took over the family business from their father Onsi in the 1990s, reaping a fortune reportedly derived from construction in Libya. Since then, the Orascom Group has enjoyed spectacular growth, in particular Orascom Telecom, which operates mobile networks in Egypt, Iraq, Algeria, Tunisia, Pakistan and Bangladesh. It also has a 16.7% stake in Hutchinson Telecom International (HTIL), a Hong Kong-based operator that has operations in several Asian countries. Orascom Telecom CEO Naguib Sawiris (pictured) has an almost legendary instinct for bidding for licenses in risky but high-growth markets. He believes that once the consolidation in global telecoms is over, Orascom will be one of the half-dozen operators left. Naguib acquired Italian telecom operator Wind and Greek operator TIM Hellas via the investment vehicle Weather Investments, but Orascom Telecom’s expansion into Asia’s emerging markets received a serious blow when Hutchison Essar, India’s fourth-largest mobile operator, was sold by Hutchison Whampoa to Vodafone in February. Naguib was disappointed by the decision of Hutchison Whampoa, which is also holding 49.7% in HTIL, as this development threatens his plans to take over control of HTIL.

Samih Sawiris of property developer Orascom Hotels & Development bought a plot of land in Switzerland in 2006 to develop a world-class Alpine tourist resort, while the youngest of the Sawiris brothers, Nassef, is running Orascom Construction Industries with a lower profile but extensive foreign interests including cement production. Orascom Construction Industries’ main operating construction businesses are the Besix Group, based in Belgium, and Contrack International, based in the US.

Mahdi al-Tajir
United Arab Emirates
€3.2bn (last year: €3.2bn)

Now 74, Mahdi al-Tajir has led an extraordinary life, based on talent, resourcefulness and business acumen.

Born in Bahrain and educated for a while at Preston Grammar School in Lancashire, UK, al-Tajir got himself noticed by the dynamic Sheikh Rashid of Dubai, who appointed him head of customs. His role as Dubai’s Mr Fix-it – for a fee, of course – and his skill as a negotiator were faithfully recorded (under a thinly disguised name) in the now sadly unavailable novel Dubai, written by US author Robin Moore. The novelist is the son of the founder of Sheraton Hotels.

Al-Tajir was the UAE’s first ambassador to the UK when the state was founded in 1971. His extensive property investments in the UK include a 15,000-acre estate in Perthshire, Scotland – where the UK’s number two bottled water brand is produced – and London’s Sheraton Park Tower hotel. In the 1980s he attempted to broker a peace deal in the Lebanese Civil War with his business partner Hani Salaam. Later, he fell out with Sheikh Rashid’s sons; according to the judgement of a UK court case, he defrauded Dubai Aluminium of millions of dollars in connivance with global commodities legend Marc Rich, who owned a neighbouring property in Switzerland.

Abdullah Al Futtaim and Majed Al Futtaim
United Arab Emirates
Abdullah Al Futtaim: €3.1bn (last year: €2.9bn)
Majed Al Futtaim: €2.8bn (last year: €2.7bn)

The Al Futtaim family’s business has been formally divided between brothers Abdullah and Majed and has interests in construction, real estate and import/export. The family’s car business includes the UAE’s exclusive agencies for Toyota, Honda and Chrysler and accounts for around one in five of all vehicles sold in the country.

Mohamed Al Fayed
Egypt
€910m (last year: €910m)

Born in Alexandria on Egypt’s Mediterranean coast, Mohamed Al Fayed started to get into the right Middle Eastern circles after he married the sister of the international arms dealer Adnan Khashoggi. He then set up his own shipping company in Egypt, and worked as a financial adviser to the Sultan of Brunei. Al Fayed owns the celebrated Hôtel Ritz in Paris as well as London luxury retailer Harrods. Long before other international investors realised the commercial potential of UK football clubs, Al Fayed bought Fulham FC; with his money the team managed to reach the Premier League, although he has fallen short of his goal of creating a second Manchester United. Al Fayed has tried in vain to obtain UK citizenship, though he holds an EU passport through his Finnish wife. His son Dodi, a Hollywood film producer, was famously killed by the side of Diana, Princess of Wales, in a car crash in Paris in 1997.

Nemir Kirdar
Iraq
€910m (new entry)

Nemir Kirdar, an Iraqi Kurd, founded Investcorp, one of the first private equity companies in the Gulf, in 1982 after a career as a banker with Chase Manhattan. Listed in Bahrain, the company has offices in London and New York and has been involved in transactions worth €24bn. It now has assets worth €7.5bn.

Investcorp’s four business areas are private equity in North America and western Europe, global hedge fund offerings, real estate investment in the US, and technology investment in North America and western Europe. Kirdar owns an estimated 20% of the firm’s shares.

Adnan Khashoggi
Saudi Arabia
€743m (last year: €743m)

Once billed as the richest man in the world, Adnan Khashoggi’s notorious lifestyle and lavish entertainment have made the Saudi-born arms dealer a media favourite. He recently received a mention in the papers for his (brief) involvement with Heather Mills McCartney 30 years ago. His sister was once married to Harrods owner Mohamed Al Fayed.

Hussein Alfardan
Qatar
Not less than €750m

Qatar should be represented at least once in any rich list of Arab countries – it now has the highest GDP per capita in the world – and Qatari businessman Hussein Alfardan is as deserving of a mention as any.

The son of Ibrahim Alfardan, one of the Gulf’s most successful pearl merchants in the first half of the 20th century, Hussein wanted to make his own way in the world. At the age of 18, he joined the Doha branch of the Ottoman Bank (later to become part of Standard Chartered).

Alfardan set up a jewellery business in 1954 and a foreign exchange with his brother in 1970. He was also instrumental in the establishment of the country’s first private sector bank, Commercial Bank of Qatar, in 1975. He was its first managing director and still holds the position 32 years later.

The Alfardan Group now comprises automobile, jewellery, exchange, marine and real estate divisions. Alfardan Automobiles is now Qatar’s exclusive importer for BMW, Ferrari, Rolls-Royce, Land Rover, Maserati and Mini. Alfardan Jewellery has branches in Qatar and Saudi Arabia, and the exchange business has branches throughout the Gulf. Alfardan is also chairman of and a major shareholder in Union Development Corporation (UDC), which is the largest private sector shareholding company on the Doha Securities Market.

These Middle East asset management vehicles are making waves in the Arab world – and beyond

Kuwait Investment Authority (KIA)

The KIA is a subsidiary of the Kuwait Investment Office (KIO). Set up in London in 1953, it receives 10% of all state oil revenues, to be invested for future generations. In 1986, it reported that government revenues from investments exceeded income from oil.

The KIA has always operated under a policy of tightly controlling information. After its stake in BP rose to 21.6% – it effectively bailed out the UK government’s share sale at a time of stock market meltdown – a public outcry led to a competition inquiry in 1988. The UK commissioner asked the Kuwaiti government to state the approximate value of the KIA’s 10 largest quoted investments and for details of the KIO’s top 15 investments in the UK other than BP. The Kuwaitis declined, and chose to sell down their stake.

In the absence of current information, in 1988, the KIO owned 14.9% of the Royal Bank of Scotland. The KIA had a €1.5bn investment in Daimler-Benz and a 20% stake in Metallgesellschaft, both of Germany.

Saudi Arabian Monetary Agency (SAMA)

As Saudi Arabia’s central bank, the SAMA is one of the few visible Saudi government investors in the world financial markets. According to its January 2007 report, the agency had total foreign currency reserves of around 884 billion Saudi riyals, equivalent to €178bn, at the end of last year. This represented a fourfold increase on the end of 2001. Investments in foreign securities had risen nearly tenfold to €121bn. These investments are not listed.

In the past, there was a rather vague distinction between government money and royal family money. In the 1990s, for example, the 7,000 princes were allotted a monthly allowance of at least €7,500 each, with those in the inner circle receiving around €11,000. King Abdullah, 82, who came to the throne in 2005, has frozen princely allowances, diplomats say.

Since Saudi Arabia lacks an official investment authority, one can only speculate on how the country’s entrepreneurs invest. It certainly seems a little convenient that the country has produced so many instant billionaires with suspiciously large cash flows, who invest only on their own behalf, over the years.

Qatar Investment Authority (QIA)

Qatar now has the highest average income in the world thanks to its vast natural gas reserves and small population – its reserves rank behind only Russia and Iran. As a minor oil exporter, it grew moderately wealthy; as a liquefied natural gas exporter, it is now a world player. The UK will soon depend on the tiny emirate for some 20% of its electricity-generating energy.

In recent years, Qatar was the top bidder for works of Islamic art in the European and US auction houses, to fill the newly built, IM Pei-designed Museum of Islamic Arts on Doha’s sweeping Corniche.

Qatar is now entering into major foreign investments, and the QIA now has around €30bn in assets. It is headed by Sheikh Hamad ibn Jassim Bin Jabor Al Thani, the country’s ambitious foreign minister, whose personal holdings include Doha’s Four Seasons Hotel. There has been talk of a joint bid with UK retailer Marks & Spencer for UK supermarket group J Sainsbury, after Three Delta, a QIA affiliate, bought a 1% stake for €68m.

Abu Dhabi Investment Authority (ADIA)

Oil-rich Abu Dhabi is the dark horse of the Gulf. Its ruler, Sheikh Khalifa, is also president of the UAE. With perhaps €530bn in funds, the ADIA is probably the world’s second-largest institutional investor after the Bank of Japan. It is also almost completely opaque; its website is merely a single page with contact details.

A recent article that named the ADIA’s investment director as Frenchman Jean-Paul Villain estimated Abu Dhabi’s oil income at €2.25bn a month. ADIA affiliate Abu Dhabi Investment Company does publish financial information, but it represents just less than 0.5% of total Abu Dhabi government funds.

Another Abu Dhabi government-owned fund, Mubadala – set up in 2002 and now chaired by Crown Prince Mohammed bin Zayed Al Nahyan – is more forthcoming. Its investments include a 25% stake in LeasePlan, one of Europe’s largest vehicle leasing firms, where it partners VW Group and Saudi Arabia’s Olayan Group, a 35% stake in Piaggio Aero Industries, and a 5% stake in legendary Italian auto maker Ferrari. It also has oil concessions in Libya and Oman as well as extensive investments in Abu Dhabi itself.

Dubai International Capital (DIC)

DIC was founded in 2004 and is owned by the government-owned Dubai Holding. Though relatively new and small – €4.5bn under management – DIC has been involved in a number of high-profile acquisitions, including the UK’s Tussauds Group – 80% of which it recently offloaded to US private equity giant Blackstone – and Travelodge. It also bid for Liverpool Football Club.

In 2005, DIC took a 3% stake in DaimlerChrysler, and in September 2006, it expressed an interest in buying into European aerospace group EADS. DIC recently created a new €750m vehicle, the Global Strategic Equities Fund, to target other companies.

DIC’s executive chairman is Sameer Al Ansari, who was formerly an accountant at Ernst & Young and chief financial officer of Dubai Aluminium. DaimlerChrysler is one of the world’s top aluminium consumers, as is EADS.

In Dubai itself, oil now represents less than 5% of GDP, overtaken in importance by real estate, transport, tourism and even aluminium.

NEWSFLASH

Ford Motor Company recently announced the €700m sale of luxury car brand Aston Martin to an investment group headed by Briton David Richards. What no one reported on at the time was the disproportionate presence of Kuwaiti money behind the deal. Kuwaiti group Investment Dar took 50% for €350m, while Adeem, also from Kuwait, took 28.5%. Dave Richards and banker John Sinders have just 12.5% between them, with Ford retaining a 9% share valued at €58m. Although Richards’ company Prodrive is crucial to the future success of the brand owing to its engineering know-how, this does not change the fact that Aston Martin is now, in all but name, a Kuwaiti car company masquerading as a British marque.