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Valentina Pasquali

Senior editor

Valentina Pasquali came to Dubai from Washington DC where she covered US real estate for Law360, a LexisNexis news website. She has written about global business, banking regulation, international affairs, US politics, and more for publications including Foreign Policy, the Washington Post and NPR.org

Valentina Pasquali
President El Sisi of Egypt rides the Cairo metro with his French counterpart, Emmanuel Macron, with planning minister Rania Al Mashat. The line is operated by a French company and Egypt is seeking more private sector involvement in its economy as it implements IMF reforms

IMF urges Egypt to accelerate sale of state assets

The International Monetary Fund has urged Egypt to move faster in selling off state assets to spur growth and reduce debt. The country’s economic growth is forecast to increase from 2.4 percent in fiscal year 2024 to 4.3 percent in fiscal year 2026, according to Jihad Azour, director of the IMF’s Middle East and Central […]

Rania Al Mashat, Egypt's planning minister, said other countries might follow the Ras El Hekma model

Egyptian minister touts Ras El Hekma as blueprint for global deals

Egypt’s Ras El Hekma deal with the United Arab Emirates shows how creditor and debtor countries around the world can work together for mutual benefit, the Egyptian minister of planning has said. It may also lead to similar agreements with other Gulf nations, according to Rania Al Mashat. “What Ras El Hekma has done is […]

Ali Osman, chief investment officer at MGX

Abu Dhabi AI chief bullish over future investment

Investment in artificial intelligence is at “a crossroads” as the build-out of underlying infrastructure, such as data centres, demands trillions of dollars more in capital, according to Abu Dhabi’s technology fund MGX. Ali Osman, MGX’s chief investment officer for AI, said on Friday that he remains optimistic about “tremendous” growth in this space even amid […]

Mubadala CEO Khaldoon Al Mubarak said the wealth fund is taking more time to look at investments

US-driven trade war forces Mubadala to change ‘assumptions’

Abu Dhabi sovereign wealth fund Mubadala Investment Company said it will take more time to consider its investments and is changing its “base case assumptions” against the backdrop of heightened global trade tensions driven by the US. The fund, which has more than $300 billion of assets under management in over 50 countries around the […]

IMF director Kristalina Georgieva had 'a lot of praise to offer' to the GCC states

IMF praises GCC economic diversification efforts

Senior International Monetary Fund officials commended Gulf states this week for their efforts to expand sources of economic growth and fiscal revenue beyond oil. They also urged more intra-GCC trade, as global commerce is roiled by steep and volatile US tariffs. “I have a lot of praise to offer because they have been pursuing reforms […]

Street vendors in the historic Balad district of Jeddah. Falling oil prices have hit the Saudi economy

Saudi Arabia’s debt burden ‘to rise more quickly’, says IMF

The International Monetary Fund has revised its forecast for Saudi Arabia’s debt burden as tumbling oil prices dent the country’s revenues. The IMF is now projecting that Saudi government gross debt will be 44.5 percent of GDP by 2029, according to the twice-yearly Fiscal Monitor released in Washington DC on Wednesday.  In last October’s report, […]

Container vessels in Istanbul's Ambarli Port. Turkey's manufacturing base is struggling with rising borrowing costs

Turkey worried that cheap Asian goods will hurt economy

Turkey is concerned that an enduring trade war between the US and China and other Asian countries may encourage manufacturers to flood Turkey’s market with cut-price goods to make up for US losses, the finance minister has said. That could damage Turkey’s own manufacturing base, already struggling with high and rising borrowing costs and domestic […]

GCC officials are expected to push for better access to advanced US semiconductors and AI tech during Donald Trump's visit to the Gulf

Donald Trump will visit Gulf nations in May

US President Donald Trump will visit Saudi Arabia, Qatar and the United Arab Emirates from May 13 to 16, the White House has confirmed. The highly anticipated visit to the Gulf region will mark Trump’s second foreign trip of his second term, as he will first travel to Rome this week for Pope Francis’ funeral. […]

Passenger on the Riyadh Metro. The IMF expects consumer prices in Saudi Arabia to rise by 2% this year

IMF cuts Saudi GDP forecast as trade turbulence continues

The International Monetary Fund has lowered its economic growth forecast for Saudi Arabia in response to escalating trade tensions and falling oil prices. The IMF’s latest World Economic Outlook, released this week, predicts that Saudi Arabia’s GDP will grow by 3 percent this year, down from its previous forecast of 3.3 percent. It now expects […]

A container vessel operated by China's Cosco in Dubai's Jebel Ali terminal, which handles huge amounts of cargo moving from Asian to Western markets

US-China trade war brings pros and cons for the Gulf

The growing trade war between the US and China, the world’s two largest economies, presents the Gulf Arab states with a complex puzzle. International commerce may shift towards new consumer and trans-shipment markets, while a recession-driven collapse in oil prices and higher-for-longer inflation because of tariffs are further risks to the region. Sectors of the […]

EU UEA Cepa Mohamed bin Zayed Ursula von der Leyen

EU and UAE to start talks on comprehensive trade deal

The UAE and the European Union are to start negotiations towards a wide-ranging free trade agreement, officials for both sides said. “The UAE shares strong and longstanding ties with the European Union and its member states,” Sheikh Mohamed bin Zayed Al Nahyan, the UAE’s president, said on X. Through a comprehensive economic partnership agreement, or […]

It was all smiles for traders working on the floor at the New York Stock Exchange after the White House announced a 90-day pause on new tariffs

Oil prices retreat despite Trump’s pause on tariffs

Oil prices fell on Thursday, despite early gains late on Wednesday following the announcement by Donald Trump that he would delay implementation of individual new tariffs on 75 countries for 90 days. US West Texas Intermediate (WTI) crude initially rose 4.88 percent to $62.49 a barrel following the announcement but in early trading on Thursday […]

Gulf nations may find comfort in US energy secretary Chris Wright's oil industry background

Gulf partners will have many questions for US energy secretary

US energy secretary Chris Wright arrives in the Gulf today at an especially turbulent time in the global economy and as oil prices plunge to more than four-year lows. Wright’s two-week visit to Saudi Arabia – the world’s second-largest oil producer – the UAE and Qatar may be in preparation for Donald Trump’s own trip […]

A worker at Jordan's Aqaba container terminal. Jordan has had a free-trade agreement with the US since 2001 and pegs its currency to the US dollar

US levies render Middle East trade deals worthless, say analysts

US president Donald Trump’s global tariff policy has bulldozed through dozens of free-trade agreements, including a handful in the Middle East. The impact on the rules of international commerce could be severe, according to industry watchers. “To take such an abrupt and quick decision from one side, where you have more than 20 years of […]

Gulf data centres will need to look beyond hydrocarbon fuel sources to renewables, experts say

Gulf urged to add more to its data centre offerings

Data centres are big business across the Gulf. But experts say the industry faces some major challenges: developing value-added goods and services, increasing research and development funding and identifying the right energy mix to power them. Sales in the GCC data centre market were worth nearly $3.5 billion last year, according to estimates by Research […]

President Donald Trump announced a raft of trade tariffs in the Rose Garden at the White House in Washington, DC

Middle East fails to escape Trump’s tariffs

US President Donald Trump unveiled far-reaching new tariffs on Wednesday, including on the United Arab Emirates, Saudi Arabia and other countries in the Middle East. Speaking from the Rose Garden of the White House, the president outlined a minimum 10 percent universal tariff on all imports into the United States, regardless of origin. This will […]

President Donald Trump signing an executive order applying tariffs to all auto imports. The GCC's bilateral trade with the US is worth around $80 billion

The Gulf must brace for indirect hits from Trump’s tariffs

Gulf states may stave off new tariffs US president Donald Trump is expected to announce but the measures’ indirect impact on the global economy and oil prices loom large. The region’s focus, industry watchers say, should be on diversifying trade relationships while embracing the UAE and Saudi Arabia playbook of investing in the United States […]

Saudi Arabia mining, Arabian Shield, Saudi mining tech, Saudi mining technology

Tech may find Saudi Arabia’s mineral wealth but mining will take years

The rocky hills of western Saudi Arabia hide huge wealth, prospectors insist. The crags and crevices are part of the Arabian-Nubian Shield, an exposed Precambrian rock formation which runs from the west of the kingdom across the Red Sea to eastern Egypt and Sudan.  The government estimates total mineral wealth at $2.5 trillion, more than […]

Cerebras founders Sean Lie, Gary Lauterbach, Michael James, Jean-Philippe Fricker and Andrew Feldman. Abu Dhabi's G42 is about to invest $335m in the company

UAE-backed Cerebras passes US security check before IPO

Cerebras Systems has cleared a US government review into its ties to the UAE’s G42, a spokesperson for the US artificial intelligence company told AGBI on Monday. The positive conclusion of the probe by the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States (CFIUS) is expected to pave the way for the California-based company’s long-awaited […]

US secretary of state Marco Rubio with Turkish foreign minister Hakan Fidan this week. The two countries hit each other with tariffs in 2018 during the first Trump administration

EU customs union makes Turkey a US tariff target

Turkey’s customs entanglement with the European Union (EU) makes it vulnerable to retaliatory tariffs from the United States in the months ahead. The White House has collated a “dirty 15” list of countries which it alleges maintain unfair levies on goods and substantial trade surpluses over the US. They are expected to be the first […]

Supporters of Istanbul Mayor Ekrem Imamoglu gather to protest against his detention. Uncertainty in Turkey may dampen US investor interest

Turkish political turmoil risks undermining US investor appetite

Last week’s arrest of the mayor of Istanbul and resulting political unrest in Turkey’s financial capital may cool US companies’ interest in doing business in the country, industry observers say. Ekrem İmamoğlu, a popular opposition figure who had been gearing up to run in the 2028 presidential election, was detained last Wednesday on charges of […]