Having set leadership in the emerging realm of digital assets as a national goal, the UAE is extending its embrace of Binance, the world’s biggest crypto exchange.

MGX, the tech investment fund created by Abu Dhabi’s Mubadala sovereign wealth fund and G42 artificial intelligence firm, announced on Wednesday that it has invested $2 billion in the company, which was founded in China and has about 1,000 employees working in Dubai.

When Binance founder Changpeng Zhao, known as CZ, pleaded guilty to U.S. money laundering charges last year and spent several months in prison, he was replaced as CEO by Richard Teng, previously head of Abu Dhabi’s Financial Services Authority,

“MGX’s investment in Binance reflects our commitment to advancing blockchain’s transformative potential for digital finance,” Ahmed Yahia, Managing Director and CEO of MGX, said in a statement.

MGX, which was established a year ago, has also invested in OpenAI and Elon Musk’s xAI. The firm is chaired by Sheikh Tahnoon bin Zayed, the UAE’s national security adviser, who is also Chairman of Abu Dhabi sovereign wealth funds ADQ and ADIA.

The Dubai Financial Services Authority, meanwhile, announced that San Francisco-based crypto payments developer Ripple Labs received regulatory approval to operate in the emirate.

“As the Middle East, Africa and South Asia’s leading global financial center, DIFC is proud to support forward-thinking companies like Ripple as they shape the future of finance and accelerate the adoption of blockchain technology in the payments industry,” DIFC Authority CEO Arif Amiri said.

Egypt will get immediate access to some $1.2 billion that the International Monetary Fund approved after a review of the economic bailout program it undertook three years ago.

The IMF gave a green light on Monday to $2.5 billion in financing for Egypt, of which the other $1.3 billion is dedicated to spending on climate change and will be allocated in installments.

In a progress report on the 2022 rescue package, the IMF found “notable delays” on economic steps it mandated to “level the playing field.”

Still, it noted progress by the government and praised its “decisive action” over the past year on selling off state assets and maintaining a flexible currency exchange rate.

Drilling and fossil fuels are in. Green hydrogen is out. That appears to be the prevailing view among oil company executives who are gathered in Houston for the S&P Global CERAWeek conference.

The mood at the annual energy summit on Monday was described as celebratory by the Washington Post as industry leaders listened to U.S. Energy Secretary Chris Wright outlining a new manifesto.

“The Trump administration will end the Biden administration’s irrational, quasi-religious policies on climate change that have imposed endless sacrifices on our citizens,” Wright said.

At breakfast presentations and corporate-sponsored receptions, oil executives promoted plans for building more fossil-fuel infrastructure, arguing that advocates for cleaner energy need to recognize that petroleum is essential to meet growing U.S. demand for power.

“We can all feel the winds of history in the sails of our businesses again,” Saudi Aramco CEO Amin Nasser said in an address calling on the industry to invest more in fossil fuels and not expect green hydrogen and other new sustainable energy sources to fill global needs.

“There is more chance of Elvis speaking next than the current plan working,” Nasser said.

Questions continue to pile up about whether Saudi Arabia’s massive Neom development can come close to fulfilling its cosmic ambitions.

A recent tip-off to problems plaguing the sprawling project was a celebrity-packed launch party in October on Neom’s Sindalah resort island, where Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman was a surprise no-show, The Wall Street Journal reports.

Three years late with more than $2 billion in cost overruns, what was supposed to be Neom’s glittering early showpiece was more an active construction site – with Sindalah’s hotels unfinished and high winds disrupting ferries and golf tee-offs, the Journal recounts. Weeks later, Neom CEO Nadhmi al-Nasr was out of a job.

“After spending more than $50 billion, the Crown Prince’s sci-fi-inspired dreams – an arid-mountain ski resort, a floating business district, and The Line, the 106-mile-long pair of Empire State Building-height skyscrapers that is Neom’s centerpiece – have collided with reality,” the newspaper writes.

Evidence of the project’s epic troubles comes from a 100-page internal audit that was presented to members of Neom’s board last spring and reviewed by the Journal.

The report estimates the capital expenditure required to build Neom to its “end-state” by 2080 at $8.8 trillion – more than 25 times the annual Saudi budget – and $370 billion for its first phase by 2035. It said the audit found “evidence of deliberate manipulation” of finances by “certain members of management.”

At Neom’s Trojena project, which will be the Gulf’s first outdoor ski resort and official site for the 2029 Asian Winter Games if it’s built by then, the report show cost overruns of more than $10 billion.

A Neom spokeswoman said the Journal was “incorrectly interpreting” and misrepresenting figures in the report, adding that the project “remains on track, demonstrating tangible progress.”

Talabat has completed the acquisition of Instashop for $32 million, consolidating the two major UAE-based food and grocery delivery brands under one company.

Both companies are controlled by German parent Delivery Hero, which initiated the merger as part of a corporate restructuring ahead of Talabat’s $2 billion IPO in December.

Instashop will continue to operate as an independent brand while leveraging Talabat’s expansive network, according to a statement issued Thursday.

“We aim to create a more seamless and efficient delivery experience for our customers across the UAE and Egypt whilst also driving further product and technology synergies across our business,” Talabat Chief Executive Tomaso Rodriguez said.

As a child with Lebanese roots growing up in Norway, Hicham Chahine got hooked on esports and couldn’t get enough of Ninjas in Pyjamas, the cyberathletic world champions from across the border in Sweden. Then he discovered finance.

At 14, he secretly used his father’s passport to open a stock trading account. At 18, he was recruited by Oslo-based Formue, one of Scandinavia’s top asset management firms. Within a decade, he was managing a hedge fund and launching multiple startups in New York.

Now 36, Chahine is Co-founder and Co-CEO of NIP Group, which he formed two years ago by engineering a merger between his beloved, nearly bankrupt Ninjas in Pyjamas and Chinese gaming powerhouse ESV5.

The combined company – whose other co-founder from ESV5 is Mario Ho, son of the late Macau casino mogul Stanley Ho – went public on the Nasdaq in July and has a current market value of $119 million. Late last year, NIP launched Aetatis, now the tenth most downloaded title in MOBA (multiplayer online battle arena) gaming.

In January, NIP signed a $40 million agreement with the Abu Dhabi Investment Office (ADIO) to move its headquarters to the UAE capital and help establish the emirate as a global center for esports, media and entertainment.

The deal comes amid Saudi Arabia’s ferocious drive to pour billions into gaming – a favorite activity of 39-year-old Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman – and capture a chunk of the $220 billion industry.

“I started getting fatigued and annoyed that, in whatever conversations we had with industry stakeholders, it was always about North America, China, and Europe – the Middle East was never a topic,” Chahine said in an interview with The Circuit. “So, I thought, what if I took my brand, moved it to the Middle East, and used it to put the Middle East region on the map for competitive video games.” 

On the horizon, Chahine looks at the world gaming market of 3.2 billion players and sees NIP reaching the top echelons.

“Ultimately,” he said, “I want to see a Middle Eastern pro player lift a world championship trophy – whatever the game – one day.”

The interview has been edited for length and clarity.

The Circuit: How did this partnership with the Abu Dhabi Investment Office come about?

Hicham Chahine: This whole story started initially four, five years ago, where I was thinking a little bit about what to do next with the company, right? It was in Stockholm, it was in Sao Paulo, it was in Shanghai, Shenzhen, and Wuhan. Felt a little bit like the company was operating in silos. We were lacking a consolidated global HQ. I met some people from Abu Dhabi Gaming at an event in Copenhagen in 2018. Also, I’m originally from the Middle East (Chahine’s mother is Lebanese). So, I always wanted to try and come back to the Middle East. So when we were ready to move on from Stockholm seven years ago, I reached out to the people I met in Abu Dhabi.

Through that year, we truly believed that the Middle East is the next frontier for esports and gaming growth. The agreement itself is very simple, even though it is complex in execution. NIP is to establish a consolidated global HQ and create 200 to 300 jobs out of the UAE, covering esports, talent management, publishing, creative studios, and events. The whole reason why they were so adamant that we take this little collaboration with Abu Dhabi Gaming and scale it to this massive initiative through ADIO is that they want to create local opportunities. In particular, 90% of the population here is interested in video games, and a large portion of the population is under 35. What happens with this young population is that they are no longer interested in working in government and traditional industries such as oil and gas. They want what Gen Z and millennials see as cooler jobs.

What are your key priorities as NIP scales up?

I’ve built one of the most iconic, legendary, largest brands in gaming, right? But I started getting fatigued and annoyed that whatever conversations we had with industry stakeholders were always about North America, China, and Europe. So, I thought, what if I took my brand, moved it to the Middle East, and used it to put the Middle East region on the map for competitive video games? We want to create opportunities and make gaming a viable career path. Ultimately, I want to see a Middle Eastern pro player lift a world championship trophy – regardless of the game – one day.

When we scouted locations before settling on Abu Dhabi, we realized that China was operating in silos as it grew, and so was the West. We needed to consolidate our global businesses. Abu Dhabi is one of the best cities in the world to live in, so the redeployment of talent is easy because the destination is attractive. While we work with Saudi Arabia and frequently travel there, their approach is very top-down – big, flashy, high-budget events. While we respect that, we align more with Abu Dhabi’s approach, which focuses on grassroots development, subsidies, and ecosystem-building from the ground up.

What inspired the launch of Aetatis?

We have 600 million eyeballs on us. The direct audience base of the NIP group is about 200 million people. We’re competing in other publishers’ games, we’re marketing other publishers’ games, we produce events for other publishers, our business produces for Tencent, for NetEase. Mobile games is arguably the largest growing gaming phenomenon around the world, right? Smartphone device penetration is ultra-high, and the mobile gaming user base just trumps the PC and console gaming user base.

We found in Aetatis a very promising game, one of the largest mobile game developments that has been done in recent years. Even before the game was launched, there were over 1 million downloads. On the first launch days, the game was triple-A rated across every single distribution platform there is. It was trending on the Apple Store and Android Store in Asia. League of Legends is very big on PC. You’re seeing other games such as Honor of Kings, and MOBA games are just what’s played in our initial market, which was the Asian market. So we went with a sci-fi, futuristic MOBA title.

What’s next?

We are looking to be publishing another title in 2025, potentially two. An area that we are looking at is we started our publishing venture in China and Asia, right? But as part of us establishing ourselves in the Middle East and putting our HQ here, that creates a natural bridge. We take concepts that work and are proven in the West and take them East and vice versa. What you’re seeing over the last couple of years is that the Middle East is this next emerging trend that is moving west. There is a demand. Arabic music, films and soap operas are making their way west.

When you live in Abu Dhabi or the UAE, a lot of the things we do here are native English. It’s already being produced in a language with localized cultural traits, which makes it easily exportable. There’s great quality, and a great amount of content is already available, which the rest of the world will have demand for. And let’s also not forget that the domestic markets are also quite large.

Waiting impatiently on the tarmac for troubled Boeing to deliver its long-delayed 777X aircraft, Dubai’s Emirates airline plans to spend $5 billion on upgrading its current stock.

Emirates President Tim Clark outlined the UAE carrier’s 2025 growth plans on Wednesday and told reporters that refitting 220 planes was critical to maintaining the airline’s standing among the best in the industry.

“We have no choice,” Clark said, ticking off the names of competing airlines that are upgrading their fleets. He said Emirates is not optimistic about the Boeing 777X deliveries arriving as scheduled for this coming October.

While Boeing struggles, industry-leading Airbus is pushing for a closer relationship with the UAE, rolling out plans to manufacture components and establish a regional maintenance hub in Abu Dhabi for its A400M military transport aircraft.

Elsewhere in the Gulf, Qatar Airways is addressing renewed demand from Syria by increasing the frequency of flights to Damascus as the country emerges from more than a decade of civil war, Bloomberg reports.

Most airlines halted flights to the Syrian capital while violence flared across the country. Qatar Airways was the first national carrier to relaunch flights to Beirut after a cease fire was reached between Israel and Lebanon in November.

Aramco, the world’s largest oil company, is slashing dividend payouts in the face of Saudi Arabia’s growing budget troubles.

The company, which is majority-owned by the Saudi government, said it expects to declare total dividends of $85.4 billion this year, a nearly 30% drop from the $124 billion distributed to shareholders in 2024.

Revenue from Aramco has long enabled the kingdom to contain its fiscal deficits but cuts in production over the past two years have crimped the company’s oil sales.

Aramco said its net profit fell over 12% to $106.2 billion in 2024, blaming a decline in revenue and higher operating costs.

The company’s action will most likely also affect debt issuances by Saudi Arabia, whose nearly $15 billion in bond sales this year make it the biggest borrower in emerging markets, the news agency said.

Crude sales and Aramco’s large annual payouts are central to funding Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman’s Vision 2030 economic overhaul plan. The level of the dividend’s distribution, however, has grown beyond the company’s earnings and dried up the $27 billion in net cash it had just over a year ago.

Aramco’s profit has declined year-on-year for seven consecutive quarters, and analysts are forecasting another drop in the fourth quarter. The company’s shares have declined 3% this year.