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FAB denies Qatari regulator's allegations; Fitch, S&P act on Lebanon

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FAB denies Qatari regulator's allegations; Fitch, S&P act on Lebanon

* Bank of England Governor Mark Carney said the world's central banks might need to jointly create a replacement reserve currency in place of the U.S. dollar, warning that the currency has had a destabilizing role in the world economy, Reuters wrote.

GULF COOPERATION COUNCIL

* The Qatar Financial Centre Regulatory Authority fined First Abu Dhabi Bank PJSC 200 million Qatari riyals for obstructing its investigation into the bank's suspected manipulation of the currency, Qatari government securities and related financial instruments. The United Arab Emirates-based lender denied the regulator's allegations, saying it made "good faith efforts" to resolve the matter with the authority and provided all relevant and responsive information that the bank was required to disclose, WAM reported.

* Global banks will compete this week to be hired for the IPO of oil giant Saudi Arabian Oil Co. planned for as early as 2020, which is expected to be the world's largest offering, insiders told Bloomberg News.

* Trading volumes in Saudi Arabian stocks are set to surge this week as index compiler MSCI Inc. completes the country's promotion to emerging market status, Bloomberg wrote.

* Saudi Stock Exchange (Tadawul) approved a request from the Saudi Arabian finance ministry to list debt instruments worth 2.26 billion riyals starting Aug. 25, Argaam reported.

* Al Mal Investment Co. - KPSC appointed Said Adh'har Hussain Daran Shah CEO, effective Aug. 25.

* Dubai-based Takaful Emarat - Insurance (PSC) appointed Tammam Abdullah acting CEO, effective Aug. 22, following CEO Fadi Jawdat Hindi's resignation.

* Abu Dhabi National Oil Company for Distribution PJSC said its shares have been certified as Sharia compliant based on the recent screening assessment of The Unified Committee of Islamic Banks for Shari’a Screening of Equities – UAE, enabling brokerage arms of Islamic banks to trade the oil company's shares.

* BBK BSC, or Bank of Bahrain and Kuwait, received approval from the Central Bank of Bahrain to trade up to 10% of its issued shares for a further 90 days, effective from Aug. 25.

* Pakistan's Habib Bank Ltd. named Adnan Haroon country manager of HBL-Oman, replacing Syed Ali Hasnain, Muscat Daily reported.

REST OF MIDDLE EAST AND NORTH AFRICA

* Bank of Israel Governor Amir Yaron said the country's economic transformation has turned it into a safe haven for emerging markets that has continued to absorb money from abroad despite maintaining near-zero interest rates, Bloomberg wrote.

* Fitch Ratings downgraded Lebanon's long-term foreign-currency issuer default rating to CCC from B-, saying the downgrade considers the intensifying pressure on the country's financing model, which raises risks to the government's debt-servicing capacity. S&P Global Ratings affirmed the country's B-/B long- and short-term foreign- and local-currency sovereign ratings with a negative outlook, warning that it could cut the ratings in the next six to 12 months if banking system deposits and the central bank's foreign exchange reserves continue to fall.

* Lebanese Finance Minister Ali Hassan Khalil said the government will "deal responsibly" with Fitch's and S&P Global Ratings' reports, which showed the urgent need for reform to help Lebanon overcome its worsening economic crisis, Reuters reported.

* S&P Global Ratings affirmed Iraq's long- and short-term foreign- and local-currency sovereign credit ratings at B-/B, with a stable outlook.

* Banque Misr (SAE) Chairperson Mohamed El-Etreby and National Bank of Egypt (SAE) Chairperson Hisham Okasha said the Egyptian central bank's decision to cut deposit and lending rates by 1.5% will boost investments and reduce the country's budget deficit, Daily News Egypt reported.

* Sudanese Prime Minister Abdalla Hamdok said the country will need $8 billion in foreign aid over the next two years to help pay for its import bills and restore trust in its local currency, Bloomberg reported, citing Al Arabiya Television.

EAST AND WEST AFRICA

* Ghana failed to raise its targeted 450 million cedis from 20-year bonds after managing to sell only 162.1 million cedis of the debt despite the bonds having a yield of 20.2%, as investors were concerned about currency risk, Bloomberg reported.

* Co-operative Bank of Kenya Ltd. reported unaudited group profit after tax and exceptional items of 7.47 billion Kenyan shillings for the period ended June 30, up from 7.14 billion shillings in the same period in 2018.

* The Bank of Tanzania has ordered banks and financial institutions to set up data centers within the country and gave them three months to do so, warning that firms that fail to comply will be fined 5 billion Tanzanian shillings, Reuters reported, citing a spokesperson for the central bank.

* Nigeria-based Zenith Bank PLC's board has approved the appointments of Henry Oroh and Al-Mujtaba Abubakar as an executive director and independent nonexecutive director, respectively, effective Sept. 1.

* African Development Bank head Akinwumi Adesina led a delegation to the G7 summit in Biarritz, France, with expanded access to finance by African women entrepreneurs a priority, Financial Afrik reported.

* The African Development Bank signed a country-specific memorandum of understanding with the governments of Portugal and Guinea-Bissau for the implementation of the Lusophone Compact, a financing platform aimed at speeding up private sector development in Africa's Portuguese-speaking nations.

CENTRAL AND SOUTHERN AFRICA

* Old Mutual Ltd. said it expects adjusted headline earnings per share for the first half to climb 7% to 13% year over year to between 106 South African cents and 111 cents, mainly driven by higher shareholder investment return in the country.

* S&P Global Ratings affirmed the BB+ long-term counterparty credit and insurer financial strength ratings and "zaAAA" national scale ratings of American International Group Inc.'s South Africa-based units AIG South Africa Ltd. and AIG Life South Africa Ltd., with a stable outlook.

* South African insurer Momentum Metropolitan Holdings Ltd., previously known as MMI Holdings Ltd., said it expects diluted normalized headline EPS for the full year ended June 30 to increase by between 45% and 65%, to between 182 cents and 207 cents. Its financial results will be released Sept. 4.

* S&P Global Ratings downgraded Zambia's long- and short-term foreign- and local-currency sovereign credit ratings to CCC+/C from B-/B, citing the country's low foreign currency reserves and rising external debt-service obligations. The outlook on the long-term rating is stable.

* The 52 commercial banks in the Central African economic zone have made fewer calls for liquidity on the region's central bank, 175.6 billion CFA francs in May 2019, down from 327.3 billion CFA francs in June 2018, according to Financial Afrik.

* MCB Group Ltd. unit Mauritius Commercial Bank Ltd. has opened a representative office at the Dubai Financial Centre, Gulf News wrote. MCB also named Sebastian Graewert chief representative officer for the Middle East and North Africa and Asia regions.

* NMBZ Holdings Ltd., the holding company of Zimbabwe-based NMB Bank Ltd., said it expects EPS for the first half to be approximately 14.55 Zimbabwean cents, up from 2.34 cents a year ago, mainly due to investment properties fair value adjustments and translation of foreign currency balances arising out of the change in functional and reporting currency from U.S. dollars to the Zimbabwean dollar.

* Angola's central bank imposed 130 fines on financial institutions in the first semester of 2019. The penalties resulted in 530 million kwanzas, with some of the most recurring mistakes were violation of procedures and deadlines in the reporting of executed operations and irregular registration of operations, Jornal de Angola reported.

IN OTHER PARTS OF THE WORLD

Asia-Pacific: RBA chief warns of global political shock; India to inject cash into banks again

Erin Tanchico, Henni Abdelghani, Pádraig Belton and Mariana Aldano contributed to this report.

The Daily Dose Middle East and Africa has an editorial deadline of 5 a.m. London time. Some external links may require a subscription. Links are current as of publication time, and we are not responsible if those links are unavailable later.

This S&P Global Market Intelligence news article may contain information about credit ratings issued by S&P Global Ratings. Descriptions in this news article were not prepared by S&P Global Ratings.