Qatar fund at ease with regional strife

DUBAI, May 16 (Arabian Business.com): The managers of a fund investing in Qatari companies insist it is safe from a falling oil price, shaky world economy and Middle Eastern political unrest as it moves from a London AIM listing to the main market. David von Simson, chairman of the Qatar Investment Fund, said recent pressure on the Qatari market in response to Arab revolutions made little impact on the robust gains seen through the second half of last year. The fund's shares increased by about 30 per cent in the last two quarters of 2010 and are little changed since the start of 2011 despite a volatile first three months of the year. Indeed, with a per-capita GDP of $76,000, according to the International Monetary Fund, Qatar is one of the richest countries in the world, making popular uprisings less likely than in more languid economies such as Egypt. "There's not really any sense on our part that political events elsewhere in the region really have a relevance to us," he said. Neither does he worry about the impact that sharp corrections in natural resource prices might have on the oil and gas-heavy Qatari economy. The Qatari government budgets on the basis of an oil price at around $55, he said, so it would have to fall a lot further from current levels, still above $100 even after the recent bouts of selling. "There is no concern on our part that the ... bubble that has slightly burst in commodities has any real impact," von Simson said. The Qatari economy is expected to grow at a rate of around seven percent per year up to 2016, according to Panmure Gordon analysts, buoyed by large public works projects such as a new port. Qatar is also due to host the football World Cup in 2022, an event that will involve considerable spending on infrastructure. The fund's biggest exposure is to the Qatari banking sector, Von Simson said, with Qatar National Bank the largest holding making up about fourteen per cent of net asset value. "We are certainly not a tracker fund but the investment adviser likes to not deviate too far from the market. And the market has got quite a heavy banking component," Von Simson said.