ADNOC, the UAE’s state-owned energy company, is looking toward the U.S. to expand its international footprint and help propel future growth.

The Abu Dhabi-based company, ranked as the world’s 12th-largest oil producer, signed an agreement with NextDecade to buy an 11.7% stake in its liquified natural gas project located in Texas.

ADNOC did not disclose the value of the deal, which is its first strategic investment in the U.S.

The Emirati company is also working on setting up an energy trading desk in the U.S., Reuters reported last week.

The NextDecade deal comes two months after Masdar, Abu Dhabi’s ADNOC-backed alternative energy company, bought a 50% stake in California-based Terra-Gen, one of the largest private renewable energy producers in the U.S.

The American market is a key part of Masdar’s strategy to develop or acquire an energy portfolio of at least 100 GW capacity by 2030.

Saudi Arabia’s Future Aviation Forum entered its second day after tallying 47 separate deals worth $19 billion.

Leading the dealmakers was Saudia Group, which owns flag carrier Saudia Airline and low-cost flyadeal, announcing an order with Airbus on Monday for 105 narrow-body aircraft.

The deal for an undisclosed price was described as the largest purchase ever from a Saudi airline. Saudia’s Airbus order was a setback for Boeing, which has yet to close a deal being negotiated with the kingdom’s new airline, Riyadh Air.

Other transactions included national air service agreements, aircraft orders, cargo and logistics, advanced air mobility, human capability, information technology, and maintenance, repair and overhaul agreements.

Abdulaziz Al-Duailej, President of the Saudi General Authority on Commercial Aviation, called the forum’s first day a “tremendous success, in terms of commercial deals, policy initiatives and agreements to elevate global connectivity.”

RedBird IMI completed its $1.45 billion acquisition of All3Media, the largest independent production company in the U.K., after receiving approval from British, U.S. and German regulators.

Under the agreement, Jeff Zucker, CEO of Abu Dhabi-backed RedBird IMI, becomes All3Media’s chairman, while All3Media CEO Jane Turton will continue to lead the company.

The London-based studio, which is jointly owned by Warner Bros. Discovery and Liberty Global, has 50 production labels, including Studio Lambert, Raw, Two Brothers Pictures, Silverback Films, New Pictures and Neal Street Productions.

Redbird IMI gave up on its bid to take over London’s Telegraph newspaper last month after encountering vigorous government opposition.

Alef Education Holding is planning an IPO on the Abu Dhabi Securities Exchange as it seeks to expand its business beyond the UAE.

The company, which develops digital tools that are broadly used in Emirati schools, said today that it will sell 20% of its shares during a subscription period that starts May 28, with trading on the ADX expected to start June 12.

“We intend to solidify our market leadership at home and grow our presence across our target markets through continued investment in our digital capabilities, broadening our product offering and expanding our geographic footprint,” Alef CEO Geoffrey Alphonso said in a statement.

First Abu Dhabi Bank and EFG Hermes UAE were appointed as lead managers and  bookrunners for the IPO.

The Premier League Trophy is coming home… to Abu Dhabi. Manchester City, owned by UAE Vice President Sheikh Mansour bin Zayed, won a record fourth straight Premier League title on Sunday, beating West Ham 3-1 in the final game of the season. City, as the club is known, is the first to clinch the champion title of English soccer’s top division four years in a row.

The team to beat in the U.K. is in many ways the UAE capital’s soccer team as well — from a business perspective at least. City is part of a multi-club ownership structure under City Football Group (CFG), owned by Sheikh Mansour and chaired by Mubadala CEO Khaldoon Al Mubarak.

Other board members include attorney Martin Edelman, who has served on the board of Abu Dhabi’s listed developer Aldar as well as an advisor to Mubadala; UAE communications fixer Simon Pearce; oil and gas executive John MacBeath; Alberto Galassi, CEO of Italian yacht builder Ferretti Group; and Abdulla Khouri, whose entertainment and events group, Ethara, puts on the Abu Dhabi Grand Prix each year.

Since coming under Sheikh Mansour’s ownership in 2008, when he bought the club for $254 million, City has become the fifth most valuable soccer team in the world, worth just shy of $5 billion — and notably had the highest revenue of any club last year, according to Forbes.

In 2019, American private equity firm Silver Lake invested $500 million for a 10% stake in CFG, and three years later made an undisclosed follow-on investment to increase its holding to around 18%.

CFG holds stakes in 13 football clubs over five continents including New York City FC and Melbourne FC. Sheikh Mansour is the chairman of Mubadala, Abu Dhabi’s second largest sovereign wealth fund, whose holdings swelled to $302 billion in assets under management last year. 

A rally this year on the Shanghai Stock Exchange has been a boon to Saudi Arabia.

The Public Investment Fund bought 153,000 shares in Alibaba during the first quarter of 2024, profiting from the stock’s 24% jump during the period, the Hong Kong-based South China Morning Post reports, citing disclosures by the PIF to the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission.

By contrast, the kingdom’s sovereign wealth fund reduced its portfolio of U.S. stocks by about half to $18 billion.

“Investors have relinquished the wait-and-watch approach [for Chinese equities] in favor of building exposure on incremental signs of easing and wiped out the underweight allocation from prior months,” Bank of America strategists said in a note on Thursday, cited by the newspaper.

The MSCI China Index has surged nearly 28% since a January low, restoring over $2 trillion of value to Chinese companies listed on the mainland, in Hong Kong and New York, according to Bloomberg data. 

Mubadala Investment Co., Abu Dhabi’s second-largest sovereign wealth fund, published its 2023 annual review today, revealing the fund has swelled to $302 billion in assets under management and deployed $27 billion over the year.

Those investments were focused on opportunities in artificial intelligence and digital infrastructure, life sciences and the energy transition as well as expanding its holdings in private credit, according to a statement.

“Amidst the complexities that defined the global investment landscape in 2023, Mubadala accelerated its shift towards targeted investments that will shape the future economy” of the UAE, Khaldoon Al Mubarak, Managing Director and Group CEO, said in a statement.

Mubadala reported $27 billion in investment returns, a 19.5% decline from the market peak in 2021 and down 6.6% compared to 2022. The portfolio achieved a five-year rate of return of 10.3%.

Qatar expects demand for liquified natural gas to keep growing and sees little prospect of a growing glut in coming years.

Speaking at the Qatar Investment Forum in Doha on Wednesday, Energy Minister Saad Al-Kaabi said his country will press on with its multibillion-dollar expansion of liquified natural gas facilities, and may consider adding further capacity if more gas becomes available, Bloomberg reports.

“If we have a reasonable economic growth going forward, I think you’ll see all that supply and demand will catch up and you’ll need another phase of development of gas in the 2030s,” he said. “I don’t think gas is going away anytime soon.”

Qatar is boosting its LNG capacity to 126 million tons a year by 2027 from 77 million a year currently. It’s targeting 142 million tons a year by the end of the decade.