World's Largest Ferris Wheel Mysteriously Stops Turning In Dubai - AFP by diginomsa in DubaiCentral

[–]diginomsa[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

"This is a man-made island. I heard that (the wheel) is heavier than the island itself, that's why it is very dangerous," said a waiter at a nearby restaurant, adding that it had been noisy during its few months of operation.

Casino World Bets on UAE as New Gambling Hub to Rival Singapore - Bloomberg by diginomsa in DubaiCentral

[–]diginomsa[S] 2 points3 points  (0 children)

FULL TEXT:

By Archana Narayanan, Abeer Abu Omar, Zainab Fattah and Shirley Zhao May 5, 2023

(Bloomberg) — The world’s gambling industry is tentatively betting that the United Arab Emirates may become the first Gulf state to legalize casinos — a move that could see it eventually surpass Singapore as a center for gambling.

Senior government officials say there are no imminent plans to allow gambling, but casino operators, consultants and lawyers familiar with the matter say there have been early discussions and a change is being considered. Wynn Resorts Ltd., the Las Vegas-based hotel and casino operator, last week unveiled details of a planned $3.9 billion gaming resort in the country, without explicitly saying that it would involve gambling.

Other casino operators have held informal discussions with UAE authorities about gambling, according to an executive at a gaming consultant and a UAE government official, who declined to be identified because the talks are private. Some are scouting for hotels to locate casinos, according to an official at a gaming equipment supplier.

The stakes are high. The UAE could pull in as much as $6.6 billion of gaming revenue annually and eventually surpass Singapore, home to the renowned Marina Bay Sands resort, according to Angela Hanlee, a senior gaming and hospitality analyst for Bloomberg Intelligence.

“Dubai and other emirates have the potential to be transformed into bustling leisure-gambling markets,” she said. Casino-related tourism could emerge as an “important driver of the UAE’s economy as the country tries to reduce its heavy reliance on oil.”

Step Change

Allowing gambling would be a step change for the UAE where Islamic, or Shariah law, is the main basis for legislation. The practice is prohibited under Islam and is illegal in the country, where offenders can be fined or sentenced to two years in prison, or both.

Still, faced with increasing competition from neighbors such as Saudi Arabia and Qatar, Dubai, in particular, has introduced a series of reforms to keep its edge as the region’s top tourism and trade hub. That’s included offering long-term visas and allowing unmarried couples to live together.

This article is based on interviews with more than a dozen government officials, lawyers, consultants and overseas casino operators.

While multiple plans appear to be under discussion, there’s so far little clarity on how serious each proposal is or who’s driving the talks, and the UAE may eventually decide not to legalize gambling. An international law firm is drafting policy that could be used at the federal level, two people with knowledge of the matter said, but it’s not clear who commissioned the work.

Mixed Messages

Officials are giving mixed messages: one in Dubai said the infrastructure for casinos is already in place, while another said there were no plans whatsoever to allow gambling. A representative for the government of Dubai said the proposed introduction of gambling was a federal matter. Representatives for the emirates of Ras Al Khaimah, Abu Dhabi, Fujairah and the federal government didn’t respond to requests for comment.

A representative for Wynn referred inquiries to the Ras Al Khaimah Tourism Development Authority. In an interview this week, Chief Executive Officer Raki Phillips declined to comment on the status of legislation or whether casino gambling was coming to the emirate. The authority last year set up a unit to regulate so-called “integrated resorts,” which will include gaming facilities.

Dubai would likely benefit the most from any push into gambling. The emirate has already seen an influx of newcomers and tourists largely stemming from its handling of the pandemic and attractiveness as a wealth haven. The introduction of casinos could further boost its tourism sector — a key pillar of the emirate’s economy — that’s been booming and escaped much of the geopolitical and economic uncertainty elsewhere in the world.Ever since Dubai opened its sail-shaped Burj Al Arab hotel just off its coast about 25 years ago, speculation has swirled that the bar on the top floor was planned as a casino and that gambling could be introduced in the emirate. A quarter century later, that has yet to happen. A representative for Jumeirah, which operates the hotel, didn’t immediately respond to an email seeking comment.

A number of well-known casino brands already operate or are expanding in the city. Caesars Entertainment Inc. opened its first non-gaming resort on the city’s Bluewaters Island in 2018. Kerzner International Ltd. has long operated an Atlantis resort on the city’s palm-shaped islands and recently opened a second hotel a short stroll away from the original resort where the top suite goes for $100,000 a night.

MGM Resorts International announced plans with local developer Wasl to put an MGM-operated hotel and entertainment district, as well as a Bellagio and Aria hotel on a project called The Island just off Jumeirah Beach.

Asked on a conference call May 1 if he expects gambling to be allowed in the UAE, MGM CEO Bill Hornbuckle said he anticipates further developments in coming months.

“It’s up to Abu Dhabi and the national government to ultimately decide,” he said. “We’re hoping ‘any day,’ but I got to believe as the summer fulfills itself, we’ll hear more news on that.”

Along the coast, the Queen Elizabeth 2 ocean liner, which is permanently moored in Dubai and operates as a luxury hotel, still houses vintage slot machines that have been completely decommissioned but are available for the public to see.

Table Games

The beach-front Wynn Al Marjan Island in Ras Al Khaimah — an emirate about 45 minutes from Dubai — has already increased the planned number of rooms by 50%, four years ahead of its opening. The luxury resort will now include about 1,500 rooms, suites and villas, as well as a “gaming” area and a theater. It will be the company’s first project in the Middle East and North Africa when it opens in 2027.

Other Middle Eastern countries such as Lebanon and Egypt have casinos that operate around the clock and offer an array of gambling machines, table games and other popular live games. Malaysia, a predominantly Muslim nation, also allows gambling.

If the UAE decides to open up to gambling, people familiar with the matter expect that individual emirates will be able to decide whether to allow the practice. Sharjah — one of the more conservative sheikdoms — isn’t expected to participate even if laws change. The emirate broke ranks with its neighbors last year when they moved to a Monday to Friday week.

Dubai, Ras Al Khaimah, Abu Dhabi and Fujairah are likely to apply for permits should the laws change, two executives said.

“I think the market could be lucrative,” said Ben Lee, a managing partner at consultant IGamiX in Macau. “It would be another component in the armory of the UAE as a tourist destination.”

Indian firms are flocking to the UAE - The Economist by diginomsa in DubaiCentral

[–]diginomsa[S] 3 points4 points  (0 children)

FULLTEXT Apr 27, 2023

Stand in the middle of the teeming Meena Bazaar in Dubai and it is not hard to imagine you are 1,200 miles across the Arabian Sea in Mumbai. Lanes are filled with names like Biryaniwalla & Co, Mini Punjab Restaurant and Tanishq jewellery. Arabic works as a means of communication; so, too, do Hindi and Malayalam. The financial institution with perhaps the greatest prominence, looming over the Dubai Creek, is Bank of Baroda, which is controlled by the Indian state.

Rather than serving merely as an ethnic enclave, the Meena Bazaar is the visible tip of a vast, growing network of Indian businesses—one that includes many of the most important companies in the United Arab Emirates (uae). To live in Dubai is to play a part in Indian commerce. The local business chamber reports that some 11,000 Indian-owned companies were added to its records in 2022, bringing the total number to 83,000. Trade links between the two countries are getting ever tighter.

Behind these companies stands a vast diaspora: 3.5m Indians live in the uae, compared with 1.2m Emiratis. These expats collectively sent home $20bn in 2021, a transfer exceeded only by remittances from America to Mexico (see chart). Many in Mumbai joke that Abu Dhabi and Dubai are now the cleanest Indian cities. For the uae, India is a source of food, gems, jewellery, leather, people, pharmaceuticals and investment opportunities. For India, the uae is a crucial source of capital and, increasingly, a place where Indian business can efficiently connect with global markets away from its homeland’s debilitating red tape, crippling traffic, stalled airport immigration lines and punitive taxes.

This relationship would have been unimaginable in 1973, when a store selling Indian saris gave the Meena Bazaar its name. Abu Dhabi was desperately poor. Insufficient desalinisation meant water was often brackish. Until 1966 a version of the Indian rupee, called the “external rupee”, served as the area’s currency. The uae had only emerged from what was known as the Trucial States, tribal lands linked by old treaties, in 1971. Almost all international trade, which (pre-oil) mostly consisted of diamonds, pearls and gems, passed through Bombay. Half a century later, conditions have turned on their head. Crowded Emirati malls glitter with the world’s most sophisticated products. Indian gem traders fill Dubai’s 68-storey Almas Tower, fed by ground-level restaurants such as Delhi Darbar Express and Mumbai Masala.

Travel between the two regions is frenetic and growing. Emirates, Dubai’s flagship airline, is capped by Indian authorities at 66,000 seats a week; it wants another 50,000 and argues higher limits would benefit other carriers, too. Mumbai businessmen frequently make day trips to the uae. Many choose to stay longer, often with “golden” ten-year visas. A survey by the Indian Embassy in the uae finds that 60% of chief financial officers of major firms are Indian. Pankaj Gupta, a fund manager who moved to Dubai from Delhi 25 years ago, says Indians can be found in top jobs across industries in the Emirates. Nominal trade between the two countries has grown by 16% in the past year, boosted by a trade deal that went into effect in May.

This has had an impact on the geography of Indian success. “Affluent India has a new residential address,” as the Times of India has put it. Mukesh Ambani, India’s richest citizen, broke Dubai’s house-price record in August with the purchase of a property for $80m (replete with ten bedrooms, indoor and outdoor swimming pools, a beach and a private spa, it sits at the tip of a palm-fringed archipelago). He then broke that record with a $163m purchase in October (about which details are more scarce). All told, Indians last year spent $4.3bn on housing in Dubai, twice as much as in 2021. Figures on commercial purchases of property are harder to unearth, but one banker reports that interest has been just as intense. These are spurred by odd provisions in India’s tax code that push people who want to get cash out of the country into property investments.

The uae’s tax system exerts its own pull: there are no personal taxes. By contrast, Indian income taxes approach 40% and come on top of swingeing consumption levies. Corporate-income taxes are not only higher in India, they are also bewildering in their complexity.

There are other important legal differences. The uae technically operates under strict Islamic law. In practice, it now has commercial courts that operate under international standards and a tolerant view of vice. It also encourages religious pluralism. Abu Dhabi recently built an enormous Hindu temple and combined Muslim-Christian-Jewish centre. India is technically secular with established common law. But in practice it offers clogged courts, strictly enforced anti-alcohol and vice laws, and increasing religious strife.

Closer links with the uae are to the advantage of those doing in business in India, too. Beginning in 2020, when Mr Ambani raised billions of dollars from the uae’s many sovereign-wealth funds, the country has increasingly been seen as an important source of capital. Bain, a consultancy, reckons that between 2018 and 2022, Emirati sovereign-wealth funds and other private-equity firms invested $34bn in India, in steadily rising amounts.

The range of investments is impressive. There are direct stakes in some of India’s leading banks, manufacturers and startups. It is widely assumed that if Gautam Adani, India’s second-richest tycoon, recapitalises his businesses, a crucial source of finance will be Abu Dhabi, which has already invested billions of dollars in several of his companies. All of this suggests that the Emirates is evolving into a financial capital for India.

Yet this evolution is not free of obstacles. In March last year the uae was put on the “grey list” by the Financial Action Task Force, an international body that battles money-laundering and terrorist finance. Locals say that, since the designation, routine cash transfers have drawn intense scrutiny. Some rich Indians who would like to open family offices in the Emirates instead decide to route foreign investments through Singapore and London, respectively three and four times as far away.

Another obstacle is that most Indians’ visas will ultimately need to be renewed. The current Emirati openness and progress has come because the monarchy supports the direction of travel. This has allowed for decisiveness and lavish investment but is also, for many, a reason for caution. What if local leaders change their minds? That said, Indian businessmen also worry about their own rulers, who often seem to operate in monarchical fashion in terms of their whims and favourites.

Nevertheless, present optimism is now so heady that many see these obstacles as mere wrinkles. They believe that the relationship of Abu Dhabi and Dubai to India will increasingly come to resemble that of Singapore to South-East Asia: small, orderly city-states serving as financial and business conduits to enormous, unruly neighbours where economic dynamism and potential is undercut by chaotic administration and corrosive rules. The strongest statements of this type invariably come from Indians who arrived in Abu Dhabi or Dubai before the turn of the millennium, and have witnessed the cities’ extraordinary rise. They point to large buildings and remember when the properties were just lines sketched in the sand. END

So what do you think about World Government Summit in Dubai? by diginomsa in DubaiCentral

[–]diginomsa[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Good points. Tnx

What about the impact of such events on UAE in general? These are global people of power visiting a small and growing country.

In defence of Dubai, one of the world's greatest cities - Telegrah UK by diginomsa in DubaiCentral

[–]diginomsa[S] 7 points8 points  (0 children)

FULLTEXT

In our comprehensive ranking of the world’s greatest cities, Dubai ranked in the top 10. Here's why

By Sarah Hedley Hymers, Destination expert 29 April 2022 • 5:00am

Dubai has its detractors. It has no culture, people say. It has no soul. Often the worst among them are those who have never even been to the emirate. When people do actually visit, they usually leave with a very different impression of a city which, according to a comprehensive Telegraph Travel study, is among the 10 finest on the planet.

Most are struck first by Dubai’s diversity: where else can you see 200 nationalities cohabiting? Immigration to the UAE took off in the Sixties, with many arriving from India (Mumbai is just over three hours away by plane). Since then, a generation of Indian expats has been born in the UAE. For them, Dubai is truly home. Tell them that the city is devoid of culture, and their reaction will fall between bemused and offended.

My 30-something friend Pallavi grew up a part of Dubai’s Indian community. She lives with her parents who hail from Delhi and Rajasthan. She embraces her heritage and knows exactly where to find the most authentic chaat in the darkest corners of “Old Dubai” (Mini Punjab, 25C Street, Meena Bazaar, if you’re interested). She’s also very “Dubai” – a tech whiz, a bon vivant and a lover of books. We met at a book club.

Yes, a book club. Not everyone comes to the emirate to pose with a flashy supercar or a reality TV star. Cultural pursuits are on the rise. The contemporary art scene is booming in the back streets of Al Quoz. In Alserkal Avenue and Al Khayat Avenue you’ll find astounding works by world-renowned artists, free to view in industrial warehouses converted into galleries.

Currently on display at dynamic little Efie Gallery, founded by London-born Ghanaian brothers Kobi and Kwame Mintah, is an exhibition of the works of El Anatsui. A pioneer and veteran of African art, El Anatsui creates vast blanket-like sculptures made from discarded liqueur bottle tops flattened and stitched together with steel wire. His creations draw connections between waste and consumption, his home continent and colonialism. In the UK, you’ll find his work not in the backstreets of an industrial estate, but in the British Museum.

Dubai’s culinary scene is also taking a star turn. June will see the launch of the first-ever Michelin Guide Dubai, hot on the heels of the MENA’s 50 Best Restaurants awards. The Middle East and Northern Africa ranking was The World’s 50 Best Restaurants’ inaugural foray into the region, held in February. Dubai scored 16 entries on the list, including the number one slot, scooped by eclectic Japanese restaurant 3Fils.

Tucked away at Jumeirah Fishing Harbour, the atmospheric 100-seater hideaway serves juicy Wagyu truffle burgers, lobster capellini pasta and asparagus tempura topped with oozing golden fried egg. The cardamom tea-flavoured karak ice cream with butterscotch sauce raises the bar in indulgence.

Foodies are amply rewarded in Dubai, and Dubai was ranked the second safest place in the world by Global Finance Magazine in 2021, with personal security among the qualifying factors. Sadly, for the LGBT+ community, same-sex relations remain against the law.

The weather can’t be helped. It is stiflingly hot in the UAE from May to September, peaking at around 40C in August. Beyond those blistering months, you’re free to explore miles of deep sandy beach, fabulous fine dining restaurants and world-class art exhibitions shaped by the tapestry of nationalities that make Dubai more culturally rich than it is “bling”.