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DUBAI: Emirati property development company Damac has awarded a $168.2 million construction contract for the Costa Brava cluster within its Damac Lagoons development to Pivot Engineering and General Contracting Co., MEED reported.
According to the report, the scope of work under this contract includes the construction of 976 townhouses for the project.
It was in November 2021 that the development works of the Damac Lagoons Project began in the inland Dubailand area.
The project also includes villas, townhouses, artificial beaches, and community facilities. Damac Lagoons Project which spans 45 million square feet also includes clusters named Venice, Morocco, Nice, Malta, Andalucia and Portofino.
Pivot Engineering and General Contracting Co. is headquartered in Abu Dhabi, and it has been working in the region for 44 years, according to the company website.
WASHINGTON: The US economy contracted slightly more than previously estimated in the first quarter amid a record trade deficit and supply chain disruptions, government data showed on Wednesday.
The Commerce Department’s third estimate of gross domestic product also showed some under- lying softness in the economy, with consumer spending revised lower and inventories higher than reported last month. This does not bode well for domestic demand and the economic outlook amid recession jitters as the Federal Reserve aggressively tightens monetary policy to tame inflation.
“The biggest effect from this report is that it leaves inventories in a more overbuilt position than previously thought, putting second quarter GDP into negative territory pending what tomorrow’s data reveal about May consumption and consumer inflation and April revisions to the same,” said Chris Low, chief economist at FHN Financial in New York.
Gross domestic product fell at a 1.6 percent annualized rate last quarter, revised down from the 1.5 percent pace of decline reported last month. Economists polled by Reuters had forecast the pace of contraction would be unrevised at a 1.5 percent rate.
The economy was initially estimated to have contracted at a 1.4 percent rate. It grew at a robust 6.9 percent pace in the fourth quarter. GDP was 2.7 percent above its level in the fourth quarter of 2019.
Consumer spending, which accounts for more than two-thirds of the economy, grew at a 1.8 percent rate instead of the 3.1 percent pace reported last month. The downgrade reflected downward revisions to financial services and insurance as well as healthcare.
Spending on long-lasting goods like motor vehicles and recreational goods was revised lower.
Businesses accumulated inventories at a $188.5 billion rate, rather than the $149.6 billion rate reported last month. As a result, growth in final sales to private domestic purchasers, which excludes trade, inventories and government spending, was revised down to a 3 percent rate last quarter. This measure of domestic demand was previously reported to have risen at a 3.9 percent rate.
RIYADH: The Saudi Cabinet has approved a law allowing the creation of a new type of company in the Kingdom to boost entrepreneurship.
The new Companies law was signed off on Tuesday, and will regulate all provisions related to companies, whether commercial, non-profit or professional.
It allows a new form of company — called a Simplified Joint Stock Company — that meets the needs of entrepreneurship and venture capital growth.
It also allows the issuance of a family charter that regulates ownership in family businesses, in addition to governance, management, work policy, employment of family members and cash profits to ensure the sustainability of these companies.
“The new law will improve the financing and business dynamics in every sector in the economy, it should have a great positive impact on the economy for the next decades,” CEO of Razeen Capital, Mohammed Al Suwayed, told Arab News.
“I can't point out a single impact because the impact is going to be happening in all of the sectors gradually,” he said.
It also reduces the legal requirements and procedures for small and medium enterprises, and simplifies the procedures for establishing companies.
Under this law, many restrictions in the incorporation, practice and exit phases and restrictions on company names have been removed.
According to the Ministry of Investment, the changes will also enhance the diversity and strength of the local market, and raise the level of competitiveness of the Saudi investment environment.
“The new corporate system came to achieve the hopes of family businesses, organize their business by concluding the family charter, encourage bold investment and address the challenges of entrepreneurs by approving the simplified joint stock company,” the Minister of Commerce Majid Al-Kassabi said.
Another law signed off was the Real Estate Brokerage law, which aims to regulate the brokers business and provide innovative and high-quality services to beneficiaries.
“The Saudi Cabinet’s ratification of the real estate brokerage law will help ensure the reliability of real estate transactions through the Real estate General Authority,” Majid Al-Hogail, Minister of Municipal, Rural Affairs and Housing said on Twitter.
He added that It will also help raise the level of services provided and preserve the rights of customers in the sector through standards and procedures for doing business.
Al-Hogail indicated that real estate brokerage services are limited to brokers licensed by the General Real Estate Authority, and brokerage contracts and real estate transactions must be submitted electronically.
He said the commission and prepayment must be determined, and that violators will be subject to penalties under the law.
Abdullah Al-Hammad, CEO of the Real Estate General Authority, described the law as a “positive addition.”
“This law complements the legislative system that the General Real Estate Authority is working on to regulate the real estate market in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia,” he told CNBC.
The new corporate system will play a pivotal role in supporting and strengthening the regulatory environment for commercial and economic entities, the chairman of the Capital Market Authority said.
The system aims to facilitate the procedures and regulatory requirements to stimulate the business environment and support investment, Mohammed Elkuwaiz added.
Approved by the Saudi Cabinet on June 28, 2022, the measure allows a new form of company — called a Simplified Joint Stock Company — that meets the needs of entrepreneurship and venture capital growth. It reduces the legal requirements and procedures for small and medium enterprises, and simplifies the procedures for establishing companies. Many restrictions in the incorporation, practice and exit phases and restrictions on company names have been removed.
BILLINGS: The US government this week is holding its first onshore oil and gas drilling lease auctions since President Joe Biden took office after a federal court blocked the administration’s attempt to suspend such sales because of climate change worries.
The online auctions start on Wednesday and will conclude on Thursday. About 200 square miles (518 square kilometers) of federal lands were offered for lease in eight western states. Most of the parcels are in Wyoming.
The sales come as federal officials try to balance efforts to fight climate change against pressure to bring down high gas prices.
Republicans want Biden to expand US crude production. But he faces calls from within his own party to do more to curb fossil fuel emissions that are heating the planet.
A coalition of 10 environmental groups said in a lawsuit filed before the sales even began that they were illegal because officials acknowledged the climate change impacts but proceeded anyway.
An immediate ruling was not expected. Interior Department spokesperson Melissa Schwartz said the agency did not have comment on the litigation.
Beginning with this week’s sales the royalty rate for oil produced from new federal leases is increasing to 18.75 percent from 12.5 percent. That’s a 50 percent jump and marks the first increase since the 1920s.
Parcels also are being offered in Colorado, Utah, New Mexico, Montana, Nevada, North Dakota and Oklahoma.
Hundreds of parcels of public land that companies nominated for leasing had been previously dropped by the administration because of concerns over wildlife being harmed by drilling rigs. More parcels covering about 49 square kilometers were dropped at the last minute in Wyoming because of potential impacts on wilderness, officials said.
But attorney Melissa Hornbein with the Western Environmental Law Center said the reductions in the size of the sales were not enough.
“They are hoping that by choosing to hold sales on a smaller amount of acreage they are threading the needle. But from our perspective, the climate science is the one thing that doesn't lie,” Hornbein said.
Fossil fuels extracted from public lands account for about 20 percent of energy-related US greenhouse gas emissions, making them a prime target for climate activists who want to shut down leasing.
Biden suspended new leasing just a week after taking office in January 2021. A federal judge in Louisiana ordered the sales to resume, saying Interior officials had offered no “rational explanation” for canceling them and only Congress could do so.
The government held an offshore lease auction in the Gulf of Mexico in November, although a court later blocked that sale before the leases were issued.
RIYADH: Saudi-based Arabian Plastic Industrial Co. has received approval for an initial public offering of 1 million shares on the Kingdom’s parallel market.
Shares to be listed represent 20 percent of the company’s share capital.
The resolution was issued by the Saudi stock market regulator Capital Market Authority in a statement on Wednesday.
The Capital Market Authority’s approval shall be valid for six months from the authority’s board resolution date. It shall be deemed cancelled if the company’s offering is not completed within this period.
The authority also granted Abdulaziz and Mansour Ibrahim Albabtin Co. approval to list 544,000 shares, representing 16 percent of the firm’s capital, on Nomu.
RIYADH: Saudi-based Arabian Drilling Co. has received approval for an initial public offering of 26.7 million shares, representing 30 percent of the firm’s capital, on the Kingdom’s stock exchange.
The Capital Market Authority’s approval shall be valid for six months from the authority’s board resolution date. It shall be deemed cancelled if the company’s offering is not completed within this period.