ST : Dubai World may sell assets

Dec 8, 2009
Dubai World may sell assets

DUBAI - DUBAI World, the cash-strapped conglomerate at the center of Dubai's debt crisis, appears set for an unaccustomed period of retrenchment after the emirate's top finance official said Monday the company may need to change course and unload assets as it struggles to pay back lenders.

What eventually gets sold remains uncertain. Clearer is the city-state's position that the government itself won't be responsible for Dubai World's debts, renewing questions about its backing of other state-run companies.

'Like any company that has commitments, part of getting liquidity is selling some assets. Of course local or foreign assets,' Dubai Finance Department Director-General Abdul Rahman al-Saleh said in an interview aired by Arab satellite channel Al-Jazeera on Monday.

'These are assets of a company, not assets of a government,' he said, adding later that the restructuring was aimed at keeping Dubai World viable going forward.

The comments appeared to cement concerns that Dubai was washing its hands of debts racked up by companies it created and backed during the city-state's frenetic boom years earlier this decade.

Easy money and unbridled ambition transformed the tiny sheikdom from desert hamlet to pulsing Arab boomtown. Dubai's main bourse fell 5.8 per cent by close of trading on Monday, with stocks sinking to their lowest level in more than four months. -- AP