The search for emerging Asian stock markets has moved out of the Pacific region and has reached the Middle East. PHILIP BOWRING reports on the emergence of the stock market in Oman.
INTERNATIONAL investors may soon have a new stock market to think about - in Oman.
The country has decided in principle to open its securities market to foreign portfolio investment, according to Commerce and Industry Minister Maqboul bin Ali Sultan.
If liberalisation proceeds, Oman will be a rarity in the Arab world in being open to foreign funds.
Officials hope foreign interest will help boost turnover and raise prices on the four-year-old Muscat Securities Market (MSM). Prices have languished due to a preference for investing in property and competition from high-yield government bond issues which are needed to finance a burgeoning deficit.
Leading shares offer dividend yields of four per cent to six per cent and price-earnings ratios are usually in single digits.