MUST-READS

• Saudi Convictions
  Saudi convicts 27 for plotting attack on US forces

  A court in Saudi Arabia sentenced 27 people to prison for planning a series of attacks against US forces in Qatar and Kuwait, with more than half of the defendants charged on Wednesday with also trying to join forces with a group in Syria to smuggle fighters to Iraq, official media reports said. The same court also sentenced on Tuesday two Saudi citizens to death and a third to 12 years in prison for taking part in violent protests in the eastern town of Al Awamiya.

• Real Estate
  Saudi’s Dar Al Arkan Real Estate Aims For 10% Growth Next Year

  Dar Al Arkan Real Estate Development Co, Saudi Arabia’s largest listed developer, plans to spend over SAR1 billion ($267 million) on projects in 2015 and aims for 10 per cent growth of its business that year, its chairman said. The company has a strong tailwind: supply of housing in the country lags strong demand, the result of rapid population growth and slow progress in government building programmes designed to ease the shortage.

• Oman
  Oman’s uncertain future

  When Qaboos seized power in 1970, Oman was an isolated and impoverished state beset by a Marxist insurgency. Yet, over the course of his 44-year reign, Qaboos has been credited with using Oman’s oil wealth to transform his nation into a rich country with a vibrant tourism industry and a high standard of living. Under Qaboos’ stewardship, Oman has also conducted an independent foreign policy that serves a unique role in the region.

  • Onsite Exclusives - Oman studies expenditure cuts amid plunging oil revenues
• Dollar-Riyal
  More peculiarity: Saudi riyal falls sharply against US dollar

  The surge of demand for dollars in the Saudi Arabian foreign exchange market may be linked to the recent plunge of global oil prices as well as a sharp fall of the Saudi stock market over the past two weeks, the traders said. They said banks were not panicking, but some were buying forwards because the dollar demand had pushed the Saudi riyal’s spot rate unusually far beyond its peg of 3.75 against the dollar.

• Family Survey
  87.2 percent of Saudi families have drivers

  A recent survey conducted by the Public Opinion Survey Unit in King Abdulaziz Center for National Dialogue found that 66.7 percent of the 1,000 participants from the Kingdom had house-maids. The survey also found that 87.2 percent of the Saudi families participating in the polls said that they had private chauffeurs.

• Twitter in KSA
  Saudi mufti blasts Twitter as evil

  “It is very unfortunate that people are asking one another about what had been posted as if it was a reliable and credible source of information when it fact it is a source of lies and misinformation,” he said, local daily Al Eqtisadiya reported on Tuesday. Al Shaikh has in the past blasted Twitter, one of the world’s fastest-growing social media platforms, as a source of misleading information and abuses.

• Houthis and Yemen
  Beyond the Houthi Takeover of Yemen

  For now, the Houthis’ main opposition is Al Qaeda. What began as a tribal quarrel for revenge and the return of ideology, has quickly gained sectarian elements. On Oct. 9, Al Qaeda detonated a suicide bomb just before a Houthi rally in Tahrir Square, at the very center of Sana’a. The explosion killed 47 people and injured hundreds more. In their statement that claimed responsibility for the attack, Al Qaeda leaders promised “hundreds more bombs” in the future.

• Saudia
  Saudi Arabian Airlines Plans IPOs of Three Service Units

  Saudi Arabian Airlines plans to raise at least 10 billion riyals ($2.7 billion) through the sale of shares in its ground-handling, cargo and maintenance units.

• Israeli Public Opinion
  Three-quarters of Israeli Jews oppose detail of Palestinian state, poll shows

  The survey, conducted by a rightwing thinktank headed by a political ally of the Israeli prime minister, Binyamin Netanyahu, makes for stark reading, contradicting previous polls showing up to 60% of Israelis in favour of a two-state solution. However, the poll confirms the argument that Israeli support for a Palestinian state is dramatically lower when they are presented with specific details rather than being asked to support the basic idea.

• Retail Sector
  Saudi Retailer Jarir To Invest $293m In Doubling Stores Over Five Years

  Jarir is one of the stock market’s most direct plays on Saudi Arabia’s rapid population growth and rising incomes, which is why its shares are up 75 per cent since end-2012 compared to a 40 per cent gain for the main market index.

  The company, which sells books, office and art supplies, computers and some other electronics, has grown from a single store in a Riyadh street in 1979 into a chain with 36 stores. Thirty-one of them are inside Saudi Arabia with the remainder in Abu Dhabi, Kuwait and Qatar.

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