termed an “ambitious expansion plan in the Gulf region,” UK insurer
Prudential’s Asian asset management unit Prudential Asset
Management (PAM), has received approval from Saudi Arabia’s Capital
Market Authority to establish an asset management company.
The new company will be formed as a joint venture with Saudi
Arabian bank Bank AlJazira and is to be named Prudential Jazira
Asset Management.
Go deeper with GlobalData
In addition to asset management the new venture will incorporate
Bank AlJazira’s takaful (Islamic Sharia law compliant) insurance
business.
Prudential and Bank AlJazira also intend to launch a new joint
venture takaful business in Saudi Arabia.
“With a GDP of $345 billion, the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia is the
largest economy in the Gulf Cooperation Council region and has the
largest stock market in terms of market capitalisation,” commented
Prudential fund management distribution and sales executive Suraj
Mishra.
“The Kingdom has shown impressive economic growth over the last few
years and we believe now is exactly the right time for us to
establish operations in this attractive and rapidly growing Sharia
market,” he added.
PAM has fund management operations in 10 other markets: China, Hong
Kong, India, Japan, Korea, Malaysia, Singapore, Taiwan, Vietnam and
the United Arab Emirates.
Total assets under management at the end of 2007 stood at $74
billion.
