Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte pledged to keep “revolutionising” Italy after a working dinner with European Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker failed to break a long-running standoff over the populist government’s push to follow through on expensive election promises.
At a Brexit summit of European Union leaders in Brussels Sunday, Mr Conte clearly had other concerns preying on his mind. The premier, a Florence law professor with no previous political experience, told reporters after the summit that he discussed the budget on the meeting’s sidelines with leaders including Angela Merkel and Emmanuel Macron.
“There’s a good atmosphere, mutual trust,” Mr Conte said, adding he may meet his populist deputies Matteo Salvini of the anti-migration League and Luigi Di Maio of the anti-establishment Five Star Movement on the budget as early as Sunday evening. “We’re confident we can complete the process to our mutual satisfaction.”
Asked if he would discuss lowering a 2.4 per cent deficit target for next year with Mr Salvini and Mr Di Maio, Mr Conte replied: “We always discuss the reforms and what is needed to carry out the promises we have made.”
Under pressure from the euro-skeptic Mr Salvini and Mr Di Maio, Mr Conte held up on arrival at the Brexit summit a thick dossier which he gave Mr Juncker at the dinner on Saturday evening, entitled “A new path for a better future. Italy’s new strategy for social and economic growth.”
“This is what we talked about, I’m giving you a preview,” Mr Conte said. “We talked about these, in five months we are revolutionising the country and we will continue to do so.” His office said the report details past reforms and those due in coming weeks, focusing on a plan to boost investments.
What irks the commission and investors most however are the targets for the 2.4 per cent deficit and 1.5 per cent economic growth next year, amid concern about the impact on Italy’s debt mountain, the biggest in the euro area in real terms. Mr Salvini and Mr Di Maio have refused to budge on these. Mr Conte said budget targets were not discussed with Mr Juncker.
At the dinner Mr Juncker said spending cuts of €6 billion to €7bn may be enough to trim the 2019 deficit, newspaper La Repubblica reported. Mr Juncker also called for Mr Salvini and Mr Di Maio to stop their verbal attacks on the European Union, the paper said.
Mr Conte may offer to postpone the start of a “citizen’s income” for the poor, a landmark Five Star pledge, and a reform to lower the retirement age, a League promise, to April in order to recover as much as €5bn that would be used for investments, newspaper Il Sole 24 Ore said.
Just how limited is Mr Conte’s room for manoeuver was underlined by Mr Salvini framing the working dinner from afar. As the dinner began, Mr Salvini posted a tweet with a tough message for Brussels: “I demand RESPECT for the 60 million Italians who, with 5 billion given as a gift every year to Europe, don’t want INSULTS, they want the possibility to study, work, retire. They sent me into government and I answer to them, and I don’t retreat.”
After the dinner ended, Mr Salvini stated in a message sent by his office: “Good Conte. Dialogue and common sense in Italy’s interest, no step backwards but a will to properly assess timing and numbers for spending and investments.”
Mr Juncker sounded an affectionate note. “We are not in a war with Italy,” Juncker said Sunday morning. He added, speaking in Italian: “Ti amo Italia (I love you Italy.)” Mr Juncker said he and Mr Conte had agreed to keep in “permanent contact” to seek to reduce the differences between the two sides.
The commission said this month that Italy wasn’t respecting EU rules on borrowing, which may lead to a so-called excessive deficit procedure. That could involve fines of 0.2 per cent of Italy’s gross domestic product, increasing to 0.5 per cent if Rome doesn’t amend its budget.
Mercer, the investment consulting arm of US services company Marsh & McLennan, expects its wealth division to at least double its assets under management (AUM) in the Middle East as wealth in the region continues to grow despite economic headwinds, a company official said.
Mercer Wealth, which globally has $160 billion in AUM, plans to boost its AUM in the region to $2-$3bn in the next 2-3 years from the present $1bn, said Yasir AbuShaban, a Dubai-based principal with Mercer Wealth.
“Within the next two to three years, we are looking at reaching $2 to $3 billion as a conservative estimate and we do see an opportunity to do so,” said Mr AbuShaban.
Mercer does not directly make investments, but allocates clients’ money they have discretion to, to professional asset managers. They also provide advice to clients.
“We have buying power. We can negotiate on their (client’s) behalf with asset managers to provide them lower fees than they otherwise would have to get on their own,” he added.
Mercer Wealth’s clients include sovereign wealth funds, family offices, and insurance companies among others.
From its office in Dubai, Mercer also looks after Africa, India and Turkey, where they also see opportunity for growth.
Wealth creation in Middle East and Africa (MEA) grew 8.5 per cent to $8.1 trillion last year from $7.5tn in 2015, higher than last year’s global average of 6 per cent and the second-highest growth in a region after Asia-Pacific which grew 9.9 per cent, according to consultancy Boston Consulting Group (BCG). In the region, where wealth grew just 1.9 per cent in 2015 compared with 2014, a pickup in oil prices has helped in wealth generation.
BCG is forecasting MEA wealth will rise to $12tn by 2021, growing at an annual average of 8 per cent.
Drivers of wealth generation in the region will be split evenly between new wealth creation and growth of performance of existing assets, according to BCG.
Another general trend in the region is clients’ looking for a comprehensive approach to investing, according to Mr AbuShaban.
“Institutional investors or some of the families are seeing a slowdown in the available capital they have to invest and in that sense they are looking at optimizing the way they manage their portfolios and making sure they are not investing haphazardly and different parts of their investment are working together,” said Mr AbuShaban.
Some clients also have a higher appetite for risk, given the low interest-rate environment that does not provide enough yield for some institutional investors. These clients are keen to invest in illiquid assets, such as private equity and infrastructure.
“What we have seen is a desire for higher returns in what has been a low-return environment specifically in various fixed income or bonds,” he said.
“In this environment, we have seen a de facto increase in the risk that clients are taking in things like illiquid investments, private equity investments, infrastructure and private debt, those kind of investments were higher illiquidity results in incrementally higher returns.”
The Abu Dhabi Investment Authority, one of the largest sovereign wealth funds, said in its 2016 report that has gradually increased its exposure in direct private equity and private credit transactions, mainly in Asian markets and especially in China and India. The authority’s private equity department focused on structured equities owing to “their defensive characteristics.”
The White Lotus: Season three
Creator: Mike White
Starring: Walton Goggins, Jason Isaacs, Natasha Rothwell
Rating: 4.5/5
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%3Cp%3EDeveloper%3A%20Aspyr%0D%3Cbr%3EPublisher%3A%20Aspyr%0D%3Cbr%3EConsole%3A%20Nintendo%20Switch%2C%20PlayStation%204%26amp%3B5%2C%20PC%20and%20Xbox%20series%20X%2FS%0D%3Cbr%3ERating%3A%203%2F5%3C%2Fp%3E%0A
Real estate tokenisation project
Dubai launched the pilot phase of its real estate tokenisation project last month.
The initiative focuses on converting real estate assets into digital tokens recorded on blockchain technology and helps in streamlining the process of buying, selling and investing, the Dubai Land Department said.
Dubai’s real estate tokenisation market is projected to reach Dh60 billion ($16.33 billion) by 2033, representing 7 per cent of the emirate’s total property transactions, according to the DLD.
COMPANY PROFILE
● Company: Bidzi
● Started: 2024
● Founders: Akshay Dosaj and Asif Rashid
● Based: Dubai, UAE
● Industry: M&A
● Funding size: Bootstrapped
● No of employees: Nine
NO OTHER LAND
Director: Basel Adra, Yuval Abraham, Rachel Szor, Hamdan Ballal
Stars: Basel Adra, Yuval Abraham
Rating: 3.5/5
'Gold'
Director:Anthony Hayes
Stars:Zaf Efron, Anthony Hayes
Rating:3/5
Company%20Profile
%3Cp%3E%3Cstrong%3EName%3A%20%3C%2Fstrong%3EDirect%20Debit%20System%3Cbr%3E%3Cstrong%3EStarted%3A%3C%2Fstrong%3E%20Sept%202017%3Cbr%3E%3Cstrong%3EBased%3A%3C%2Fstrong%3E%20UAE%20with%20a%20subsidiary%20in%20the%20UK%3Cbr%3E%3Cstrong%3EIndustry%3A%3C%2Fstrong%3E%20FinTech%3Cbr%3E%3Cstrong%3EFunding%3A%3C%2Fstrong%3E%20Undisclosed%3Cbr%3E%3Cstrong%3EInvestors%3A%3C%2Fstrong%3E%20Elaine%20Jones%3Cbr%3E%3Cstrong%3ENumber%20of%20employees%3A%3C%2Fstrong%3E%208%3Cbr%3E%3C%2Fp%3E%0A
RedCrow Intelligence Company Profile
Started: 2016
Founders: Hussein Nasser Eddin, Laila Akel, Tayeb Akel
Based: Ramallah, Palestine
Sector: Technology, Security
# of staff: 13
Investment: $745,000
Investors: Palestine’s Ibtikar Fund, Abu Dhabi’s Gothams and angel investors
