Qatar acquires stake in UK's 3rd-largest bank

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Tuesday, July 01, 2008



WorldNetDaily

Qatar acquires stake in UK's 3rd-largest bank

Barclay's agrees to minority investment from sovereign investment fund


Posted: June 30, 2008
7:29 pm Eastern



By Jerome R. Corsi



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WorldNetDaily


Doha, Qatar
Britain's Barclay's Bank has agreed to a minority investment from a Qatar sovereign investment fund, reflecting further fallout in the U.S. sub-prime real estate market and a growing involvement of Middle Eastern states investing petrodollar profits to acquire equity stakes in key Western financial institutions.

Barclays Bank, the third largest bank in Britain, has agreed to accept a £1.8 billion, or approximately $3.6 billion, investment from Qatar Investment Authority for a minority stake of 7.7 percent. The bank wants to raise new capital on world markets after taking unprecedented loses in subprime real estate securities held in the bank's investment portfolio.

WND previously reported Sheik Hamad bin Jassim bin Jabor Al-Thani, Qatar's prime minister and the head of Qatar Investment Authority, a $50 billion sovereign wealth fund, has already acquired 20 percent of the London Stock Exchange.

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According to Bloomberg, Qatar Investment Authority also purchased approximately 7 percent of the shares of Credit Suisse when the Zurich-based financial giant suffered losses in similar real estate security holdings.

Meanwhile, the state-owned China Development Bank announced it plans to spend about £136 million, approximately $272 million, to maintain its 3-percent equity ownership position in Barclays, avoiding share dilution as the bank seeks new capital on world markets.

Citibank announced today Barclays may need to raise as much as £9 billion, approximately $18 billion, in capital in order to avoid being under-capitalized in what analysts anticipate may be additional write-downs required to reflect yet unreported further loses in bank-owned securities related to the sub-prime and commercial real estate markets.

With approximately one-third of the world's proven oil reserves located in Qatar, the small Gulf State country has seen windfall oil profits as oil has surged to reach a record high of $143 a barrel today on world markets.

Last week, NYSE Euronext beat out the London Stock Exchange to purchase 25 percent of Qatar's stock exchange, the Doha Securities Market, for an investment of £127 million, approximately $250 million.

NYSE Euronext is an American-European corporation that operates several stock exchanges, including the New York Stock Exchange in New York City and Euronext N.V. in Paris.

The move positioned the Doha Securities Exchange to operate as a global exchange, while giving NYSE Euronext a stake in the Middle East.

Qatar announced today a plan to join the United Arab Emirates and Kuwait in refusing to increase oil output in an effort to force oil prices lower on world markets.

In an interview with Bloomberg in Madrid, Qatar's oil minister Abdullah bin Hamad al-Attiyah said, "I never heard any panic about a shortage of supply, just about the high price. We see in the market there are lots of cargoes."

Bloomberg reported Saudi Arabia has decided to raise its production by 300,000 barrels a day in June and will add a further 200,000 barrels a day in July.
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