Markaz total equity grows by 7% in 2011

Kuwait Financial Centre S A K ‘Markaz’, one of the Middle East’s leading investment banking and asset management companies, announced the results of the first half of 2011.Markaz posted a net profit of KD 750,000 and a 2 fils EPS in H1, 2011 compared to KD 1.44 million and a 3 fils EPS for the same period of 2010. Short term debt is KD 5.02 million, where as total debt is KD 32.51 million representing 5.6 per cent and 36.6 per cent respectively of Total Equity. The Total equity grew by 7 per cent compared to the same period of 2010 and accounted to KD 89.79 million. Markaz AUM for H1 2011 is KD 906 million. Diraar Al Ghanim - Chairman & Managing Director of Markaz said: “Markets performed well in the beginning of Q2 but market volatility continued due to US debt struggle, Europe’s sovereign debt crisis and the fall of oil prices affected the region’s markets and had a severe negative sentiment on investors. Although regional countries generally are surplus countries and not shortage countries, the big challenge for decision makers in Kuwait and the Gulf is to channel these surpluses to development projects that will help the region’s population and create new investment opportunities.” Al Ghanim added, “We firmly believe that the Private and Public Partnership (PPP) is the ideal way to achieve an effective and sustainable development in our country. We believe that the development plan, which is achieving a steady progress, can positively stimulate Kuwait stock exchange based on solid fundamentals, as did the current tenders of the two new projects Al Zoor water and energy Plant and Kuwait Health Insurance Company.” Manaf Alhajeri - CEO at Markaz also commented, “Concentrating on the fundamentals of corporate governance, risk management and the commitment to ensure a safe financial management practices enabled Markaz to weather and overcome markets’ cycles. Over a period of time these fundamentals have remained the core of Markaz corporate culture and investment approach.” Alhajeri added by saying, “The nature of market conditions in present times and the fast changing variables require quick actions to provide a highly dynamic investment solutions with the flexibility to move between various asset classes to cater to investors’ demands. We have recently sensed a change in investors’ appetite towards highly transparent and low risk investment tools that will generate more returns than bank deposits.” MENA EquitiesDuring Q2, Mena equity markets, though volatile, witnessed almost a muted performance as the S&P Pan Arabian Composite Index closed the quarter with a marginal gain of 0.3 per cent. From / Gulf Today