Dubai – Mubasher: The first ever Arab IPO summit organised by UMS Conferences kicked off in Dubai today with widespread participation from senior officials across capital markets, stock exchanges, investment banks, and top companies. Participants will discuss the latest trends in the region and regulations on listings for issuers.
The event came on the backdrop of continued expansion of the regional economy and changes in the capital markets across the MENA region.
"Governance is an integrated, well-practised and adhered to system underpinning quality management. A successful IPO flows from an intricate, interlinking, skilled and choreographed dance of at least seven specialist practitioners, all in the service of the company,” said Richard Stockdale, president of Chartered Institute for Securities & Investment.
He added that a successful IPO enhances the prospects of the company, investors, practitioners, regulators and the jurisdiction.
For his part, Mayur Pau, MENA IPO leader, Ernst & Young, MENA said, "IPO activity in H1 2015 was driven by the IPO of several companies from Egypt and Saudi driven by positive market sentiment and regulatory reforms in the region.
Rashed Al Balooshi, CEO, Abu Dhabi Securities Exchange (ADX) said, "With our economy growing at a steady pace, ADX can attribute a good part of that growth to UAE business and industry, which generally have helped create prosperity in our society.”
For his part, Mohamed Omran, Chairman of the Egyptian Exchange pointed out that current market conditions should not act as obstacles facing market activity and development. He also said stock exchanges must create opportunities to overcome the internal and external challenges.
“We facilitate listing procedures and have reduced the required documents for listing, granted the listing committee more flexibility and created a team to promote listing activities. We will now also focus on continuing support for SMEs in addition to attracting public companies to have access to finance through the capital market,” stated Omran
