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Constructing The Burj Khalifa Skyscraper Essay

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When Sheikh Mohammed gave the green light to his project managers to construct the Burj Khalifa, a Dubai skyscraper 40 percent taller than the world tallest building, it became fairly apparent that the Sheikh had some big global ambitions for his oil rich bit of turf, the United Arab Emirates (UAE).
While the Burj may be reaching for the Arabian stars another manmade construction was already well underway in the UAE, a fiscal paradise. Indeed, the Dubai International Free Zone (DIFC), which has managed to lure 313 authorized lenders, insurance firms, asset management companies and fund firms. Among them are 22 of the 25 biggest banks in the world. In figures what this all means is an inflow of foreign direct investment of 30 billion …show more content…

Ahmed Ali Al Sayegh, chairman of Abu Dhabi Global Market, said: “Jan Bladen is ideally positioned to address our key priorities which are to develop the legal, regulatory and operational platforms that will provide the foundation for the growth of The Global Market.” Indeed GMAD is a huge strategic initiative for Abu Dhabi, which is intended to become a significant contributor to the UAE economy, according to Bladen.
Chief Economist at National Bank of Abu Dhabi is optimistic that the Abu Dhabi World Financial Market can help Abu Dhabi to recycle its petrodollars. In other words, reinvest the funds earned from the export of its oil within the UAE and the Middle East. Certainly there are a lot of petrodollars to recycle, Abu Dhabi contains approximately 7 percent of the world’s oil and has huge Sovereign reserves.
Cash and gas rich Qatar, a sovereign Arab emirate, has also set up a financial district the Qatar Financial Centre. Furthermore, what was meant to be a sober Saudi Arabian alternative to the UAE’s financial free zones the Saudi’s have also recently completed their new financial district, King Abdullah Financial District. The district will contain 42 buildings and 900,000 square meters of office space—similar in scale to London’s Canary Wharf.

A question worth pondering over is with all this spare capacity in financial services, as a result of these financial free zones mushrooming in the emirates

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