The giant container ship Ever Given traversed Egypt's Suez Canal again for the first time since it blocked the waterway for six days in March after running aground.
The 400-metre vessel successfully completed its 22nd journey through the canal on its way to China, the Suez Canal Authority said on Friday.
The canal's most experienced pilots boarded the ship to make sure its passage was as smooth as possible, the SCA said. The vessel was also accompanied by the authority's two largest tugboats in case any problems occurred.
Unlike its previous passage through the canal, the ship was not fully loaded.
The Panama-registered ship returned to the canal through the northern Port Said entrance, travelling in the opposite direction to which it was headed in March, a little more than a month after it departed Egyptian waters.
The grounding of the Ever Given caused millions in revenue losses for the canal’s authority as well as private shipping companies whose vessels either had to wait at mooring stations or make the longer and more expensive journey around the Cape of Good Hope in South Africa.
After the ship was refloated in March, it was detained at the Great Bitter Lake, halfway through the canal, pending a legal dispute between the canal’s authority and the ship’s owners over the compensation sum for the blockage, the resulting loss in revenue and damages sustained to the canal.
The container ship then headed to Rotterdam where it remained until August 2, when it began its journey back to go through the canal. It also made a stop in Malta, according to the online shipping tracker Vessel Finder.
The ship left Egyptian waters after a ceremony on July 7 in the Suez Canal city of Ismailia, where the compensation contract was signed between canal officials and the ship owner’s legal team.
Though the compensation sum was never officially announced by the canal’s authority, which is characteristically tight-lipped about the inner workings of the waterway, The National received confirmation that it had received $540 million.
"The return of the Ever Given cements the importance of the canal as a vital passage from the West to the East. It also reflects the amicability of the authority's relations with the ship's owners," said SCA chairman Admiral Osama Rabie on Friday.
The authority's relationship with the ship's owners, Japanese freight company Shoei Kisen Kaisha, was somewhat strained during the ship's detention in light of a heated legal dispute over the compensation sum.
The canal authority has been undertaking an ambitious plan to revamp the canal by adding new mooring stations and more technologically advanced equipment to help ships navigate the canal more efficiently.
It announced plans to dredge a second lane in the famed waterway, many portions of which remain single-lane. The introduction of a second lane will ensure more ships are able to navigate the canal at once in addition to making it easier to deal with any vessels that run aground.
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Mercer, the investment consulting arm of US services company Marsh & McLennan, expects its wealth division to at least double its assets under management (AUM) in the Middle East as wealth in the region continues to grow despite economic headwinds, a company official said.
Mercer Wealth, which globally has $160 billion in AUM, plans to boost its AUM in the region to $2-$3bn in the next 2-3 years from the present $1bn, said Yasir AbuShaban, a Dubai-based principal with Mercer Wealth.
“Within the next two to three years, we are looking at reaching $2 to $3 billion as a conservative estimate and we do see an opportunity to do so,” said Mr AbuShaban.
Mercer does not directly make investments, but allocates clients’ money they have discretion to, to professional asset managers. They also provide advice to clients.
“We have buying power. We can negotiate on their (client’s) behalf with asset managers to provide them lower fees than they otherwise would have to get on their own,” he added.
Mercer Wealth’s clients include sovereign wealth funds, family offices, and insurance companies among others.
From its office in Dubai, Mercer also looks after Africa, India and Turkey, where they also see opportunity for growth.
Wealth creation in Middle East and Africa (MEA) grew 8.5 per cent to $8.1 trillion last year from $7.5tn in 2015, higher than last year’s global average of 6 per cent and the second-highest growth in a region after Asia-Pacific which grew 9.9 per cent, according to consultancy Boston Consulting Group (BCG). In the region, where wealth grew just 1.9 per cent in 2015 compared with 2014, a pickup in oil prices has helped in wealth generation.
BCG is forecasting MEA wealth will rise to $12tn by 2021, growing at an annual average of 8 per cent.
Drivers of wealth generation in the region will be split evenly between new wealth creation and growth of performance of existing assets, according to BCG.
Another general trend in the region is clients’ looking for a comprehensive approach to investing, according to Mr AbuShaban.
“Institutional investors or some of the families are seeing a slowdown in the available capital they have to invest and in that sense they are looking at optimizing the way they manage their portfolios and making sure they are not investing haphazardly and different parts of their investment are working together,” said Mr AbuShaban.
Some clients also have a higher appetite for risk, given the low interest-rate environment that does not provide enough yield for some institutional investors. These clients are keen to invest in illiquid assets, such as private equity and infrastructure.
“What we have seen is a desire for higher returns in what has been a low-return environment specifically in various fixed income or bonds,” he said.
“In this environment, we have seen a de facto increase in the risk that clients are taking in things like illiquid investments, private equity investments, infrastructure and private debt, those kind of investments were higher illiquidity results in incrementally higher returns.”
The Abu Dhabi Investment Authority, one of the largest sovereign wealth funds, said in its 2016 report that has gradually increased its exposure in direct private equity and private credit transactions, mainly in Asian markets and especially in China and India. The authority’s private equity department focused on structured equities owing to “their defensive characteristics.”
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