Netflix’s newest Arabic Original, The Exchange, follows the story of two women as they take on the Kuwaiti stock market in the 1980s, with all the glam and roar of the decade.
Before high-speed internet revolutionised the international market, the stock exchange was arguably an even more ruthless place than it is now, as traders had to jostle for shares in mosh pit-like swarms, under the chaos of telephone calls, wailing faxes and snaking duplicity.
It was no different in Kuwait. The country boasted the third-largest stock market, only behind the US and Japan, while it was still running in a parking garage — a site that had once been a camel market.
At the beginning of The Exchange, the Kuwaiti stock market has already become an official establishment, on par with its global counterparts. In the midst of this cut-throat bustle are cousins Farida and Muneera — characters who are inspired by the first women in the Kuwaiti stock market — disrupting the all-boys club while dressed in the best of 1980s fashion, including pencil skirts and padded shoulders.
“Muneera is a strong, independent woman,” Mona Hussain, the Kuwaiti actress who takes on the role of one of the show’s two protagonists, tells The National.
“She knows what she wants. She is focused on her goals. She meets her challenges with the aim of overcoming them. Even when she helps others, she has her own motives for doing so. She wants to be successful, that’s her main goal.”
While Muneera is driven by personal ambition, her cousin Farida, played by Rawan Mahdi, has another motive. Recently divorced and in a precarious financial position, she seeks to provide for herself and her daughter as she is faced with mounting tuition bills her ex-husband refuses to pay.
“It is also a coming-of-age story in a way,” Karim El Shenawy, who directed the series alongside Jasem AlMuhanna, says. “The series shows a woman going through a tough divorce and rediscovering herself. On the opposite side, there’s Muneera, who is strong and unstoppable.”
Despite being the only two women on the trade floor, there is also a searing rivalry between them.
“There’s no sisterhood between them,” El Shenawy says. “There’s actually competition between them, which made the story special. It’s not a stereotypical female drama. There’s quite a lot of tension between them.”
These elements, El Shenawy says, give The Exchange a universal timbre, ensuring that it will resonate with a larger audience beyond the Middle East.
“The story is set in Kuwait in the 1980s, but it may apply now in another country as well. It will still apply 20 years from now in different contexts.”
The Exchange is written by Nadia Ahmad, Anne Sobel and Adam Sobel. The show’s producer, Abdullah Boushahri, says a great deal is inspired by Ahmad’s childhood as she witnessed her mother take on the male-dominated stock market in 1980s Kuwait.
“It is inspired by true events,” he says. “Obviously some characters and events were fictionalised. It started with Nadia’s childhood story and then grew with Adam and Anne’s writing team.”
The Exchange is also alluring in the way it recreates 1980s Kuwait, which, El Shenawy says, was done by scouring antique shops and thrift stores in the country and the US.
El Shenawy explains he was initially worried about whether the show’s stylists and set designers would find all the props needed. When doing a period piece, one detail out of place can inhibit the audience from immersing into its world.
“It’s how you believe you’re in this era. I talked to the prop master of the show, and he took me into a room with old computers, televisions and keyboards, and I knew we were safe," he says.
"In a period drama, you can have great performances and a great storyline, but a wrong prop would take you out of this world. For the show to come this way is really a collaborative work..”
While the wardrobe goes a long way in establishing the year the show is set in, El Shenawy says the show’s stylist was also careful about faithfully replicating the hair and make-up.
“People wear things from the 1980s now in 2023,” he says. “It really was the hair and make-up that helped make that distinction.”
Boushahri has developed a penchant for producing period projects, including Netflix’s first Kuwaiti series The Cage, featuring several cast members of The Exchange, including Mahdi and Hussain AlMahdi.
“[It is] the same team that worked with me last year. We’ve done some period pieces and we’re lucky enough to have done those to lead us to this moment. It was almost like we were training for this moment in the stock exchange," he says.
While The Exchange presents a milestone in his career, Boushahri is intent on making more period features set in the region.
“I love period pieces,” he says. “Kuwait has a lot of history, the '60s, '70s, '80s and '90s were rich in events, from war to fashion, sports, arts and politics. There are many stories I want to tell.”
If you go
The flights
Emirates and Etihad fly direct to Nairobi, with fares starting from Dh1,695. The resort can be reached from Nairobi via a 35-minute flight from Wilson Airport or Jomo Kenyatta International Airport, or by road, which takes at least three hours.
The rooms
Rooms at Fairmont Mount Kenya range from Dh1,870 per night for a deluxe room to Dh11,000 per night for the William Holden Cottage.
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Canada
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WHAT IS A BLACK HOLE?
1. Black holes are objects whose gravity is so strong not even light can escape their pull
2. They can be created when massive stars collapse under their own weight
3. Large black holes can also be formed when smaller ones collide and merge
4. The biggest black holes lurk at the centre of many galaxies, including our own
5. Astronomers believe that when the universe was very young, black holes affected how galaxies formed
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UAE currency: the story behind the money in your pockets
Gothia Cup 2025
4,872 matches
1,942 teams
116 pitches
76 nations
26 UAE teams
15 Lebanese teams
2 Kuwaiti teams
COMPANY%20PROFILE%20
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COMPANY%20PROFILE
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THE SPECS
Engine: 1.5-litre
Transmission: 6-speed automatic
Power: 110 horsepower
Torque: 147Nm
Price: From Dh59,700
On sale: now
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COMPANY PROFILE
Name: Qyubic
Started: October 2023
Founder: Namrata Raina
Based: Dubai
Sector: E-commerce
Current number of staff: 10
Investment stage: Pre-seed
Initial investment: Undisclosed
The specs
- Engine: 3.9-litre twin-turbo V8
- Power: 640hp
- Torque: 760nm
- On sale: 2026
- Price: Not announced yet
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Fight card
Preliminaries:
Nouredine Samir (UAE) v Sheroz Kholmirzav (UZB); Lucas Porst (SWE) v Ellis Barboza (GBR); Mouhmad Amine Alharar (MAR) v Mohammed Mardi (UAE); Ibrahim Bilal (UAE) v Spyro Besiri (GRE); Aslamjan Ortikov (UZB) v Joshua Ridgwell (GBR)
Main card:
Carlos Prates (BRA) v Dmitry Valent (BLR); Bobirjon Tagiev (UZB) v Valentin Thibaut (FRA); Arthur Meyer (FRA) v Hicham Moujtahid (BEL); Ines Es Salehy (BEL) v Myriame Djedidi (FRA); Craig Coakley (IRE) v Deniz Demirkapu (TUR); Artem Avanesov (ARM) v Badreddine Attif (MAR); Abdulvosid Buranov (RUS) v Akram Hamidi (FRA)
Title card:
Intercontinental Lightweight: Ilyass Habibali (UAE) v Angel Marquez (ESP)
Intercontinental Middleweight: Amine El Moatassime (UAE) v Francesco Iadanza (ITA)
Asian Featherweight: Zakaria El Jamari (UAE) v Phillip Delarmino (PHI)
Mina Cup winners
Under 12 – Minerva Academy
Under 14 – Unam Pumas
Under 16 – Fursan Hispania
Under 18 – Madenat
Fines for littering
In Dubai:
Dh200 for littering or spitting in the Dubai Metro
Dh500 for throwing cigarette butts or chewing gum on the floor, or littering from a vehicle.
Dh1,000 for littering on a beach, spitting in public places, throwing a cigarette butt from a vehicle
In Sharjah and other emirates
Dh500 for littering - including cigarette butts and chewing gum - in public places and beaches in Sharjah
Dh2,000 for littering in Sharjah deserts
Dh500 for littering from a vehicle in Ras Al Khaimah
Dh1,000 for littering from a car in Abu Dhabi
Dh1,000 to Dh100,000 for dumping waste in residential or public areas in Al Ain
Dh10,000 for littering at Ajman's beaches
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Benefits of first-time home buyers' scheme
- Priority access to new homes from participating developers
- Discounts on sales price of off-plan units
- Flexible payment plans from developers
- Mortgages with better interest rates, faster approval times and reduced fees
- DLD registration fee can be paid through banks or credit cards at zero interest rates
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Reputation
Taylor Swift
(Big Machine Records)
Ferrari 12Cilindri specs
Engine: naturally aspirated 6.5-liter V12
Power: 819hp
Torque: 678Nm at 7,250rpm
Price: From Dh1,700,000
Available: Now
Match info
Manchester United 4
(Pogba 5', 33', Rashford 45', Lukaku 72')
Bournemouth 1
(Ake 45 2')
Red card: Eric Bailly (Manchester United)
The smuggler
Eldarir had arrived at JFK in January 2020 with three suitcases, containing goods he valued at $300, when he was directed to a search area.
Officers found 41 gold artefacts among the bags, including amulets from a funerary set which prepared the deceased for the afterlife.
Also found was a cartouche of a Ptolemaic king on a relief that was originally part of a royal building or temple.
The largest single group of items found in Eldarir’s cases were 400 shabtis, or figurines.
Khouli conviction
Khouli smuggled items into the US by making false declarations to customs about the country of origin and value of the items.
According to Immigration and Customs Enforcement, he provided “false provenances which stated that [two] Egyptian antiquities were part of a collection assembled by Khouli's father in Israel in the 1960s” when in fact “Khouli acquired the Egyptian antiquities from other dealers”.
He was sentenced to one year of probation, six months of home confinement and 200 hours of community service in 2012 after admitting buying and smuggling Egyptian antiquities, including coffins, funerary boats and limestone figures.
For sale
A number of other items said to come from the collection of Ezeldeen Taha Eldarir are currently or recently for sale.
Their provenance is described in near identical terms as the British Museum shabti: bought from Salahaddin Sirmali, "authenticated and appraised" by Hossen Rashed, then imported to the US in 1948.
- An Egyptian Mummy mask dating from 700BC-30BC, is on offer for £11,807 ($15,275) online by a seller in Mexico
- A coffin lid dating back to 664BC-332BC was offered for sale by a Colorado-based art dealer, with a starting price of $65,000
- A shabti that was on sale through a Chicago-based coin dealer, dating from 1567BC-1085BC, is up for $1,950
Key facilities
- Olympic-size swimming pool with a split bulkhead for multi-use configurations, including water polo and 50m/25m training lanes
- Premier League-standard football pitch
- 400m Olympic running track
- NBA-spec basketball court with auditorium
- 600-seat auditorium
- Spaces for historical and cultural exploration
- An elevated football field that doubles as a helipad
- Specialist robotics and science laboratories
- AR and VR-enabled learning centres
- Disruption Lab and Research Centre for developing entrepreneurial skills
GAC GS8 Specs
Engine: 2.0-litre 4cyl turbo
Power: 248hp at 5,200rpm
Torque: 400Nm at 1,750-4,000rpm
Transmission: 8-speed auto
Fuel consumption: 9.1L/100km
On sale: Now
Price: From Dh149,900
WHEN TO GO:
September to November or March to May; this is when visitors are most likely to see what they’ve come for.
WHERE TO STAY:
Meghauli Serai, A Taj Safari - Chitwan National Park resort (tajhotels.com) is a one-hour drive from Bharatpur Airport with stays costing from Dh1,396 per night, including taxes and breakfast. Return airport transfers cost from Dh661.
HOW TO GET THERE:
Etihad Airways regularly flies from Abu Dhabi to Kathmandu from around Dh1,500 per person return, including taxes. Buddha Air (buddhaair.com) and Yeti Airlines (yetiairlines.com) fly from Kathmandu to Bharatpur several times a day from about Dh660 return and the flight takes just 20 minutes. Driving is possible but the roads are hilly which means it will take you five or six hours to travel 148 kilometres.
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