Jordan's foreign reserves surges 18.45% in March
Released by the Central Bank of Jordan, the data 'reflects the country's stable external financial position,' the Jordan News Agency reported.
This aligns with S&P Global's decision in September to upgrade Jordan's long-term foreign and local currency ratings to 'B+' from 'BB-.' The agency also reaffirmed its 'B' short-term ratings and raised its transfer and convertibility assessment from 'BB' to 'BB+.'
S&P noted at the time that Jordan's structural economic improvements are expected to remain resilient, despite regional pressures.
The agency also indicated at the time that Jordan is well-positioned to leverage international support and has sufficient domestic policy buffers to mitigate impacts from regional conflicts on tourism and the broader economy.
Tariff items exemptions
Up to 91 percent of tariff items enjoy full or partial exemptions under Jordan's policy of promoting investment and supporting production, according to the Customs Department Director General.
In his remarks to the Jordan News Agency, Ahmed Akalik explained that the exemptions cover various items under international agreements, local decisions, or investment incentives, with the largest waivers to raw materials.
He highlighted that just 9 percent of items are subject to duties between 0 and 25 percent, depending on the commodity type, and that domestic exports are completely duty-free.
Akalik went on to note that the department processed over 950,000 customs declarations in 2024, underscoring the need for new strategies to improve efficiency and transparency, in alignment with King Abdullah's vision to enhance government performance and empower the private sector.
Arab Fund plans $750m for Jordan
The Arab Fund for Economic and Social Development plans to allocate approximately $750 million to Jordanian projects in the coming years, leveraging partnerships with international and regional institutions such as the World Bank and the European Investment Bank.
A major focus will be the National Water Carrier project, designed to transport desalinated water from Aqaba to Amman, tackling significant water shortages.
The fund will prioritize sustainable energy initiatives such as solar and wind power to address Jordan's increasing energy needs.
Plans also include investments in education and healthcare infrastructure, such as building new schools and developing hospitals.
AFESD plans to promote regional economic integration, establishing Jordan as a key hub in the energy, healthcare, and education industries. The strategy will emphasize job creation, youth empowerment, and gender equality.
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Arab News
6 days ago
- Arab News
Jordan tourism revenues climb 11.9% in H1 despite regional headwinds
RIYADH: Jordan's tourism revenues rose 11.9 percent year on year in the first half of 2025 to reach $3.67 billion, underscoring the sector's resilience amid geopolitical tensions in the region. According to data from the Central Bank of Jordan, the growth came despite a slight setback in June, when monthly revenues fell 3.7 percent to $619.2 million, state-run Petra news agency reported. Turki Faisal Al-RasheedDespite this, Jordan's performance reflects a broader tourism surge across the Middle East, with a May release by the World Travel & Tourism Council showing the sector added $341.9 billion to gross domestic product and 7.3 million jobs in 2024, with projections of $367.3 billion and 7.7 million jobs in 2025. Saudi Arabia led the region with a 148 percent rise in international tourism revenue in 2024, according to its Ministry of Tourism, while Oman, the UAE, and Qatar continued to attract strong visitor flows through investment, connectivity, and major events. Citing the central bank data, Petra said: 'Tourism revenues from Asian visitors surged by 42.9 percent during the first half of the year, while revenues from European tourists increased by 35.6 percent, Americans by 25.8 percent, Arabs by 11.5 percent, and other nationalities by 43.0 percent.' It added: 'Conversely, revenues from Jordanian expatriates visiting the Kingdom registered a modest decline of 0.8 percent over the same period.' Spending by Jordanians on outbound tourism rose 3.3 percent year on year in the first half of 2025, reaching $999.7 million, despite a 22.7 percent decline in June alone, when spending fell to $195.6 million. This comes on the back of a strong start to 2025, with Jordan welcoming 1.51 million visitors in the first quarter — a 13 percent increase from the same period last year — while receipts rose 8.85 percent to 1.22 billion Jordanian dinars ( $1.72 billion), according to the Ministry of Tourism and Antiquities' first-quarter report. The recovery was further supported by the return of air connectivity, which had nearly disappeared in 2024. New agreements with European carriers expanded the number of low-cost direct routes to 25 this year, including 20 to Amman for the summer and five to Aqaba in the winter. These routes are expected to bring in around 270,000 travelers, the report added. Looking ahead, the ministry said it is developing a new National Tourism Strategy for 2025–2028, building on the previous plan and aligning with the country's Economic Modernization Vision. The updated roadmap aims to diversify source markets, including China, India, Russia, Africa, and Southeast Asia, and promote high-potential segments such as medical, wellness, faith-based, adventure, and meetings, incentives, conferences, and exhibitions, or MICE, tourism.
Arab News
08-07-2025
- Arab News
Foreign currency sukuk issuance projected to reach $80bn in 2025
RIYADH: The global sukuk market is poised to maintain its strength in 2025, with foreign currency-denominated issuances expected to reach between $70 billion and $80 billion, according to a new report by S&P Global. In the first half of 2025, foreign currency sukuk issuances rose 8.94 percent year on year to $41.4 billion, driven by increased activity in the UAE, Bahrain, and Kuwait. Saudi Arabia remained a key player, contributing 38.9 percent of the total market volume, as local banks continued to support Vision 2030-related initiatives. Earlier this year, Fitch Ratings shared a similar outlook, forecasting that Saudi Arabia would remain a major driver of US dollar-denominated sukuk and debt issuance in 2025 and 2026. Banks in the Kingdom alone are expected to issue over $30 billion as institutions seek to diversify their funding sources. The increase in global sukuk issuance came despite external headwinds, including new US tariffs and delayed interest rate cuts. S&P noted that issuers in core Islamic finance markets took advantage of brief periods of market stability to secure funding. 'We expect performance in the second half of the year to depend on the evolving geopolitical situation in the Middle East. However, since we don't expect a full-scale regional war, we think the resilient foreign currency issuance trends observed in the first half will continue,' S&P Global said in the report. 'It will also be supported by the Fed's expected reduction in interest rates. Therefore, we maintained our forecasts for foreign currency-denominated issuances to reach about $70 billion to $80 billion for the full year in 2025,' it added. Foreign currency sukuk issuance had already climbed to $72.7 billion in 2024, a 29 percent increase from the previous year, supported by significant financing needs in Islamic finance hubs and fiscal pressures due to lower oil prices. According to S&P, geopolitical tensions are not expected to significantly disrupt issuance this year. Instead, market activity will hinge on the direction of monetary policy, domestic liquidity conditions, and investment trends in key Islamic finance countries. Local currency issuance Despite the robust performance of foreign currency sukuk, total sukuk issuance globally fell 15 percent in the first half of 2025 to $101.3 billion. The decline was largely due to a steep drop in local currency sukuk, which fell to $59.8 billion from $81 billion a year earlier. Malaysia, Saudi Arabia, Qatar, and the UAE all reported weaker domestic issuance. S&P attributed this to liquidity constraints in some markets and improved fiscal performance in others, reducing the need for domestic borrowing. 'For example, we have observed a significant drop in local currency issuances in Saudi Arabia, where banks' liquidity is instead being channeled into financing Vision 2030. The drop was mainly underpinned by lower issuances from the government,' the agency said. Shariah Standard 62 S&P also pointed to ongoing uncertainty surrounding the implementation of Shariah Standard 62 by the Accounting and Auditing Organization for Islamic Financial Institutions . In April, AAOIFI announced amendments to the draft standard following industry feedback but did not provide details or a timeline. The proposed guidelines aim to harmonize key elements of the sukuk structure, including asset backing, ownership transfer, and trading rules. 'The implementation process following the amendment is also uncertain. This means that it is now very difficult to determine the implications of adopting the new standard on market performance,' S&P noted. 'The need to issue prior to the adoption of the standard may also abate since issuers and investors no longer perceive the disruption as imminent,' it added. Fitch Ratings had earlier warned that the standard could significantly reshape the sukuk market and potentially increase fragmentation if adopted in its current form. Sustainable sukuk Sustainable sukuk issuance surged 27 percent in the first half of 2025 to $9.3 billion, up from $7.4 billion in the same period last year, according to S&P. Banks, led by the Islamic Development Bank, accounted for nearly half of the total, followed by corporates from the GCC and Malaysia. These instruments fund environmentally friendly projects such as renewable energy and green infrastructure. Saudi issuers dominated the market, accounting for over 60 percent of total sustainable sukuk issuance. S&P attributed this to the alignment of Islamic finance with sustainability principles, the central role of the Islamic Development Bank, and strong funding demand from local banks. In January, Fitch projected that outstanding ESG sukuk globally would exceed $50 billion in 2025, with Saudi Arabia playing a leading role. The total value of ESG-focused sukuk climbed 23 percent year on year to $45.2 billion in 2024, according to Fitch. In February, Saudi Arabia also raised €2.25 billion ($2.36 billion) through a euro-denominated bond offering under its Global Medium-Term Note Program, including its first green tranche.
Arab News
04-07-2025
- Arab News
Global Markets — stocks and dollar dip as Trump's spending bill passes, trade deal deadline nears
LONDON: Stocks slipped on Friday as US President Donald Trump got his signature tax cut bill over the line and attention turned to his July 9 deadline for countries to secure trade deals with the world's biggest economy. The dollar also fell against major currencies with US markets already shut for the holiday-shortened week, as traders considered the impact of Trump's sweeping spending bill which is expected to add an estimated $3.4 trillion to the national debt. The pan-European STOXX 600 index fell 0.8 percent, driven in part by losses on spirits makers such as Pernod Ricard and Remy Cointreau after China said it would impose duties of up to 34.9 percent on brandy from the EU starting July 5. US S&P 500 futures edged down 0.6 percent, following a 0.8 percent overnight advance for the cash index to a fresh all-time closing peak. Wall Street is closed on Friday for the Independence Day holiday. Trump said Washington will start sending letters to countries on Friday specifying what tariff rates they will face on exports to the US, a clear shift from earlier pledges to strike scores of individual deals before a July 9 deadline when tariffs could rise sharply. Investors are 'now just waiting for July 9,' said Tony Sycamore, an analyst at IG, with the market's lack of optimism for trade deals responsible for some of the equity weakness in export-reliant Asia, particularly Japan and South Korea. At the same time, investors cheered the surprisingly robust jobs report on Thursday, sending all three of the main US equity indexes climbing in a shortened session. 'The US economy is holding together better than most people expected, which suggests to me that markets can easily continue to do better (from here),' Sycamore said. Following the close, the House narrowly approved Trump's signature, 869-page bill, which averts the near-term prospect of a US government default but adds trillions to the national debt to fuel spending on border security and the military. Trade the key focus in Asia Trump said he expected 'a couple' more trade agreements after announcing a deal with Vietnam on Wednesday to add to framework agreements with China and Britain as the only successes so far. US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said earlier this week that a deal with India is close. However, progress on agreements with Japan and South Korea, once touted by the White House as likely to be among the earliest to be announced, appears to have broken down. The US dollar index had its worst first half since 1973 as Trump's chaotic roll-out of sweeping tariffs heightened concerns about the US economy and the safety of Treasuries, but had rallied 0.4 percent on Thursday before retracing some of those gains on Friday. As of 2:00 p.m. Saudi time it was down 0.1 percent at 96.96. The euro added 0.2 percent to $1.1773, while sterling held steady at $1.3662. The US Treasury bond market is closed on Friday for the holiday, but 10-year yields rose 4.7 basis points to 4.34 percent, while the two-year yield jumped 9.3 bps to 3.882 percent. Gold firmed 0.4 percent to $3,336 per ounce, on track for a weekly gain as investors again sought refuge in safe-haven assets due to concerns over the US's fiscal position and tariffs. Brent crude futures fell 64 cents to $68.17 a barrel, while US West Texas Intermediate crude likewise dropped 64 cents to $66.35, as Iran reaffirmed its commitment to nuclear non-proliferation.
