Battle heating up between Dubai and Qatar financial centres
In another sign that there's something of a battle heating up to become the Gulf's preeminent financial centre, the DIFC has drastically slashed its operating fees at a time when Doha is looking to aggressively develop its financial sector.
From January next year the DIFC will implement a revised set of operational fees for companies base din the business park - charging AED160 a square foot, down from an estimated AED400 for the same space previously.
The DIFC's sky-high costs have seen it flounder this year. Earlier this year, it embarked on a second round of redundancies, as new registers slowed to a snails pace and existing firms were reluctant to expand their presence during such austere times.
As Bloomberg points out - some 40% of its office space is currently vacant.
Qatar attempting to gain market share
Sentiment around Qatar's financial centre, meanwhile, has started to turn more positive. The QFC has also been paring back costs, particularly for asset management and insurance firms, as it attempts to compete with the DIFC's dominance.
Still, only seven new companies have signed up in the QFC this year, compared to 16 in 2009, suggesting that predictions of aggressive recruitment drives in peninsula may have been a little premature.
"A few international investment banks have hired coverage bankers for Qatar, but their teams are still relatively small - usually no more than half a dozen people," says Bill Allum, managing director at headhunters Execuzen. "The domestic banks have been steadily recruiting, and there's been evidence of asset managers hiring there. Again, though, this is relatively small numbers."
But there are reasons to believe that Qatar could be on the up. While many of the domestic banks in Dubai have suffered from increased loan impairments and worries over exposure to Dubai World this year, government intervention in Qatar's 'big three' banks has meant they have some of the cleanest balance sheets in the region.
Meanwhile, the huge number of infrastructure projects set to kick-start next year as a result of Qatar's successful 2022 World Cup bid is likely to see international investment banks look to get closer to the action.
Dubai unphased by competition
The DIFC's chief executive Abdulla Al Awar told Zawya Dow Jones that it was "not concerned" by the threat of other regional financial centres and that 90 new companies had registered this year.
What's more, Qatar's potential to grow as a financial centre and create a large number of new jobs has been talked up for a few years now. Early in 2010, recruiter Kinsey Allen suggested that over 5,000 new financial services jobs would be created in Doha this year.
Conversations with other financial services recruiters, however, suggest that the bulk of hiring in the GCC still takes place in Dubai.
