Source: AME Info, Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates — ALUMINUM BAHRAIN GAINS ON SETTLING MULTI-MILLION DOLLAR FRAUD SUIT WITH ALCOA : The Bahrain All-Share Index ended up 0.20 percent at 1,063.92 points. Shares of Aluminum Bahrain or Alba added 1.24 percent to hit BD0.49. Earlier in the day Alba said settled a $447m fraud suit filed against U. S. based aluminum giant, Alcoa, in the United States District Court for the Western District of Pennsylvania. “This momentous achievement is the first case brought by a foreign business in a U.S. court, to recover losses resulting from alleged corrupt activity by corporations and individuals in the United States and elsewhere,” Alba said in an e-mailed statement. The investigations were carried out by the US Department of Justice under the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act, which continued throughout the last four years since the case was filed on February 28th, 2008. They reported that Alba paid out $420m in inflated prices for operations between 1997 and 2009. “This is a remarkable achievement for any corporation to win against an industrial heavyweight for a multi-million dollar settlement,” Alba added.

RISING NINE-MONTH PROFITS LIFT QATAR OMAN INSURANCE: The QE Index closed flat at 8,478.67 Wednesday. Shares of Qatar Oman Investment gained half a percentage point to reach QR12.03. Earlier in the day, Qatar Oman Investment Company said its interim financial statements for the nine-months period revealed a net profit of QR19.2m for the nine months period ended September 30, 2012 in comparison to a net profit of QR13.8m for the corresponding period last year.

ABU DHABI MARKET AND ITS HEAVYWEIGHTS CLOSE WEDNESDAY TRADING UNCHANGED: The ADX General Index ended flat (at 2,652.18), so did shares of telecom leader Etisalat, merger candidates Aldar Properties and Sorouh Real Estate as well as First Gulf Bank. Like in Dubai, investors were paralyzed by the IMF’s latest remarks the world economy was in danger of declining again. Sharjah-based Dana Gas bucked the trend and gained 4.44 percent.

NEW IMF WARNINGS FOR GLOBAL ECONOMY WEIGH ON DUBAI MARKET: A lackluster Dubai Financial Market (DFM) fell 0.20 percent Wednesday to close at 1,625.52. Shares of the DFM, the only publicly listed Arab bourse, slipped 0.93 percent to Dhs1.06 as trading volumes plummeted. Only 56m shares worth Dhs71.8m changed hands. On Tuesday, the IMF warned that the Euro zone debt crisis has worsened compared to six months ago and added that the world economic slowdown put the global financial system’s recovery in limbo. Consequently, Dubai investors preferred to stay on the sidelines. At the DFM, Emaar ended down 0.30 percent at Dhs3.67, while Arabtec Construction gained 1.20 percent to hit Dhs2.55.

JORDANIAN PUBLIC DEBT CLIMBS 17 percent: According to initial figures by the Jordanian finance ministry, the country’s public debt has widened by 17 percent during the first eight months of this year, topping JD15.7bn, Jordan Times has reported. By the end of 2011, Jordan’s overall public debt stood at JD13.4bn, according to the ministry figures, which showed that borrowing from local banks went up by over JD2bn, while loans from international lenders rose by less than JD300m.

AL OMANIYA POSTS 15 percent INCREASE IN Q3 NET INCOME: Oman’s largest non-banking financial firm, Al Omaniya Financial Services has said its net assets have crossed $500,000 in its unaudited third quarter results for the period ended September 30, Muscat Daily has reported. The company’s assets jumped 39 percent to $512.616m from $368.8m in the same period a year earlier, it said. Profit after tax rose 15.08 percent to OR3.7m, compared with OR3.21m in the same period last year.

OMAN’S NON-OIL SECTOR’S CONTRIBUTION TO GDP TO GROW GRADUALLY: Oman’s central bank has said the contribution of the country’s non-oil sector to the GDP is expected to grow gradually, while there will be a gradual decrease in the contribution of the oil sector, Times of Oman has reported. Up to June 2012, the year-on-year credit growth has been 19.4 percent compared with 12.6 percent in the same period last year, which indicates steady increase in credit consistent with recovery of the non-oil activities in Oman, he said.

EGYPT SEES IMF DEAL BY MID NEXT MONTH: Egypt’s finance minister Mumtaz al-Saeed has said the government aims to reach a deal with the International Monetary Fund (IMF) within two weeks of a visit by an IMF team to Cairo at the end of October, Reuters has reported. “There will be a meeting at the end of the month and I expect within two weeks it (the loan deal) will be done,” al-Saeed said, referring to talks for a $4.8bn IMF loan. Egypt has indicated it might seek more.

KUWAIT APPROVES 2012-2013 BUDGET WITH $26BN DEFICIT: The Kuwaiti cabinet has approved the 2012/2013 budget projecting a shortfall of KD7.3bn ($26bn), mainly through calculating oil income at a very conservative price, AFP has reported. Kuwait has projected a budget deficit every year for the past 13 fiscal years, but has annually ended up with a healthy surplus, accumulating around $250bn. The budget, which started on April 1, will be issued by an Emiri decree because parliament was dissolved on Sunday, finance minister Falah al-Hajraf said.

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Source: AME Info, Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates