Dubai’s Emirates NBD bank to raise $750 mln in perpetual bonds: Reuters

Dubai’s largest bank, Emirates NBD, is set to raise $750 million with perpetual bonds non-callable for six years, a document seen by Reuters showed.

The bank is offering investors a 6.125 percent yield for the paper, which is similar to an equity instrument in that it has no maturity, said Reuters.

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Dubai's GDP shrinks

The news comes after Dubai’s real gross domestic product (GDP) shrank by 3.5 percent year-on-year in the first quarter of 2020 amid the coronavirus pandemic.

Executive Director of Dubai Statistics Center (DSC), Arif al-Muhairi said: “It was expected that in the first quarter of 2020, the economy will experience a decline due to the global impact of the COVID-19 pandemic,” according to a statement issued by the Dubai Media Office (DMO).

“The worldwide restrictions on movement for individuals through air, sea, and land entry points, as well as the unprecedented intensification of precautionary measures, which limited the flow of freight across borders, had significant repercussions on international trade and the global economy,” al-Muhairi added.

The report, however, highlighted that some sectors of Dubai’s economy “retained their growth momentum” in Q1, including real estate, finance and manufacturing. Real estate activity grew by 3.7 percent in Q1.

On the other hand, trade, and transport and storage activities contracted in Q1 2020 compared to the same time period last year. Trade declined by 7.5 percent and transport and storage activities declined by 5.5 percent.

Another sector which was hurt in Dubai, a travel and tourism hub in the Middle East, was the accommodation and food services sector (hotels and restaurants), which declined by 14.8 percent in Q1 from the same time period last year.

With Reuters