ARABIAN BUSINESS.COM: Dubai World, the investment firm of the Dubai government, said on Tuesday it is holding on to US real estate assets amid a subprime housing crisis that has slowed its investment decisions this year.
Dubai World, with a portfolio of over $200 billion, is still seeking investments in transport and logistics, financial services and for opportunistic deals in a battered real estate market after a credit crisis that has rattled global markets.
"I'm more cautious because I don't think there's total transparency on how bad the situation is. At the moment we don't know, and it means a lot for our investment planning," its chief investment officer Yu Lai Boon told newswire Reuters in an interview.
He said the concern is that the contagion, which has caused Western banks to write down billions of dollars and caused liquidity to dry up, could spread to Japan and China.
"If the world's top three economies are hit, then we have the makings of a worst case scenario. So we have to know," he said.
Dubai World, which invests via subsidiaries Nakheel and Istithmar, has a portfolio that ranges from British port operator P&O to New York retailer Barneys, and includes over $20 billion in real estate outside Dubai.
Yu said Dubai World had sold two buildings in New York near the market's peak in the first quarter of last year, and reinvested the gains in US markets that have seen corrections, but will retain its remaining US property assets. Subprime Crisis Slowing Investments >>> By Daryl Loo | April 29, 2008
The Dawning of a New Dark Age (Paperback - UK)
The Dawning of a New Dark Age (Hardback - UK)
