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Lebanon

A Zara store in London. Azadea operates Zara franchises in the Middle East and plans to focus on expansion

Dubai Holding-backed retailer Azadea puts IPO on hold

Azadea Group, which is backed by an investment company owned by Dubai’s ruler Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum, has put its initial public offering on the back burner, it has been reported. Dubai Holding acquired a minority stake in the Beirut-based retailer in 2018, valued at $1 billion. The IPO pause is not down to […]

Lebanon Riad Salameh

Judge in Lebanon paves way for ex-central bank chief indictment

A judge in Lebanon has published a court decision in the embezzlement charges against the country’s former central bank chief, Riad Salameh, paving the way for an indictment. Judge Bilal Halawi published a “presumptive decision” concluding that Salameh, who served as central bank governor for 30 years before his term ended in disgrace in July 2023, had engaged […]

Central bank governor Karim Souaid has said Lebanese banks need to merge

Lebanese central bank chief tells banks to merge

Lebanon’s new central bank governor pledged to depositors on Friday they would recover their money and told local banks to increase their capital through mergers. Karim Souaid said during a ceremony as he took office that small depositors would be given priority in obtaining their funds and that the central bank and the government would […]

Karim Souaid, a former investment banker and asset manager, is the sixth governor of the Banque du Liban

After 2 years without a central banker, Souaid divides Lebanon

Last Thursday the Lebanese cabinet approved Karim Souaid as the sixth governor of the country’s central bank, Banque du Liban.  Souaid, a former investment banker and asset manager, takes up the post after two years in which Lebanon had no formal banking chief and as the country enters a seventh year of economic and political […]

People walk past Lebanon's Central Bank building in Beirut. The IMF is calling for greater data transparency in the Lebanese economy

IMF says Lebanon needs new strategy to reboot economy

Lebanon needs a comprehensive strategy for rebooting its economy in order to access a programme with the International Monetary Fund, with stress on data transparency, the IMF said on Thursday. “First and foremost, what is needed is a comprehensive strategy for economic rehabilitation,” said spokesperson Julie Kozack in a press briefing. She confirmed that the […]

Zaytouna Bay, Beirut. Lebanon has Eurobonds with a face value of $31.3 billion outstanding

Lebanon bondholders pick US bank for debt talks

Lebanon’s bondholders have hired US investment bank Houlihan Lokey as financial adviser for eventual debt talks, two sources familiar with the situation told Reuters. Lebanon has been engulfed in a severe economic crisis since 2019, when its financial system collapsed under the weight of massive state debts, which prompted a sovereign default in 2020. In […]

Inflation in Lebanon rose to more than 300% last year, according to the World Bank

Economy in Lebanon remains severely depressed, IMF says

The Lebanese economy remains severely depressed, its condition exacerbated by a two-month war last year between the Iranian-backed Lebanese Hezbollah group and Israel, in which infrastructure and homes were destroyed, the International Monetary Fund has said. An IMF team visited the country last week and met the new government led by President Joseph Aoun and […]

Lebanon bonds Nawaf Salam

Lebanon bonds rally to near-5-year high with new government

Lebanon’s international bonds rallied more than one cent on Monday, two days after a new government was formed. The country’s dollar-denominated bonds jumped 1.1 cents to being bid at around 18.3 cents across most maturities, the highest level since March 2020, Tradeweb data showed. The latest rise extends a sharp turnaround for the bonds, which have lingered […]

Shoppers in Baalbek, Lebanon. The government is planning to unlock customers' bank deposits after lengthy delays

Lebanon to refund locked bank deposits

Lebanon’s new government and the central bank are devising a plan for commercial banks to pay billions in locked deposits to bank customers. Wasim Al-Mansouri, the central bank’s acting governor, on Tuesday told the Saudi Arabian daily Aleqtisadiah that a solution would not be possible without the presence of an executive authority capable of drawing […]

Nayla Tueni told Frank Kane over lunch that the financial crisis in Lebanon 'taught us that, if we are going to survive, we need to expand'

Nayla Tueni: ‘I am a journalist, a journalist, a journalist’

Nayla Tueni is as close as you get in the Middle East to media aristocracy. She is the fourth generation of a family that, for the best part of a century – through wars, assassinations, man-made disasters and economic crises – has kept publishing Annahar, a Lebanese broadsheet described by Time magazine as “the newspaper […]

Saudi Arabia's foreign minister Prince Faisal bin Farhan Al-Saud meets with Lebanon's parliament speaker Nabih Berri in Beirut

Saudi Arabia has ‘great confidence’ in Lebanon’s reforms

Prince Faisal bin Farhan Al-Saud visited Beirut on Thursday, the first trip to Lebanon by a Saudi foreign minister in 15 years.  The visit coincided with early signs of recovery in Lebanon’s economy as it improves relations with Gulf states and others following the election of President Joseph Aoun. After his meeting with Aoun, Bin […]

An abandoned train at a station in Lebanon. The railway could form a major trade link

Lebanese officials promote revival of rail network

Lebanon is promoting the revival of the country’s defunct railway system that could link to neighbouring Syria and Iraq and become part of China’s proposed Belt and Road Initiative in the region. The train transport system in Lebanon had linked the capital Beirut with Tripoli near the Syrian border before it came to a standstill […]

Beirut, Lebanon, where public debt exceeded GDP at the end of 2023

Lebanon and Sudan swell Arab countries’ public debt

Public debt in Arab countries swelled by nearly $142 billion at the end of 2023, mainly because of a sharp rise in obligations by Lebanon and war-battered Sudan. Total debt increased despite a fall in Egypt’s public, mostly domestic, dues as a result of a large depreciation in the pound against the US dollar. The […]

Lebanon GCC aid

Slow restart predicted for GCC aid to Lebanon

A resumption of badly needed GCC financial aid to Lebanon may take time, even though most Gulf countries have given their blessing to the new Lebanese president Joseph Aoun, according to observers. The six nations of the Gulf Cooperation Council were previously among the biggest aid donors and investors in Lebanon, before they cut assistance as […]

People celebrate after Lebanon's army chief Joseph Aoun was elected president, in the town of Klayaa, southern Lebanon

New Lebanese president faces uphill task on economy

Joseph Aoun, the new Lebanese president who was elected on Thursday, faces an uphill task of pulling his country out of the worst financial crisis since independence, according to analysts. After a presidential vacuum of more than two years, the 60-year-old Maronite Christian and former army commander takes over the Baabda presidential palace against the […]

Lebanon's army chief Joseph Aoun at the parliament building in Beirut after being elected as president

Lebanon’s bonds rally after new president elected

Lebanese government bonds extended their three-month-long rally on Thursday as the crisis-ravaged country’s parliament voted in a new head of state for the first time since 2022. Lebanese lawmakers elected army chief Joseph Aoun as president. It came after 12 failed attempts to pick a president and boosted hopes that the country might finally be able to start addressing […]

Vero Video length: 04:08

Vero Labs taps into the fan-based asset economy

Vero Labs, the social networking company owned by the Lebanese billionaire Ayman Hariri, has partnered with the blockchain platform Avalanche to tap into the multi-trillion-dollar fan-based asset economy sector of the sports and entertainment industry.  Last year Vero Labs acquired Tokenise Stock Exchange, a regulated global marketplace where users can buy, sell and trade fan-based […]

Celebrations in Syria for the downfall of Assad, which Standard Chartered's Eric Robertsen says could have a positive effect on the region

Syria upheaval could be a sign of progress for the region

The removal of the Assad regime in Syria is a “step in the right direction for the region”, according to a leading economist from Standard Chartered. Eric Robertsen, managing director of global head of research and chief strategist at Standard Chartered, was discussing the fallout of a series of geopolitical crises during a media round […]

Massad Boulos seen with Donald Trump during an election campaign visit to Dearborn, Michigan. Boulos is father-in-law to Trump's daughter Tiffany

What Massad Boulos can do for US-Middle East trade

The rise of a Lebanese tycoon and Trump in-law to the White House suggests business links and personal ties between the US and the Middle East will be front and centre for the new administration. Incoming US President Donald Trump announced on social media on Sunday that Massad Boulos, the father-in-law of his daughter Tiffany, […]