Copyright carveout

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WHAT WE’RE TRACKING TODAY

THIS MORNING: PIF considers securitization + other options to raise funds

Happy hump day, friends. We’re rounding out earnings season with what we hope is the final major batch of disclosures — including Al Arabia, MBC Group, Derayah Financial, and others — as we also look at the industrial production index. While the index might be down y-o-y, taking a step back shows that we’re on an upward trajectory as the September reading is (literally) not half as bad as August’s.

Worth your time this morning is our lead story in the news well, which dives into how Saudi Arabia has written an explicit carveout for AI training into its copyright law, putting it in a small group with Japan, the EU, and Singapore. Who benefits? Anyone building Arabic-language models in the Kingdom rather than licensing them from abroad.

And while we’re on AI: Humain has taken its second state check in a week, this time from the National Infrastructure Fund to cover chips and the transmission to run them.

Every week brings a new AI partnership, sovereign fund deal, or funding round in the Gulf and across MENA.

EnterpriseAM AI + Innovation, our newest newsletter, tells you which ones matter and why.

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Beyond equity

The Public Investment Fund (PIF) is looking into tapping future income from its portfolio companies to raise funds, with securitization among the options being considered, Reuters reports, citing sources familiar with the matter. The approach would allow PIF to raise funds from investors against its companies’ expected revenue instead of relying on fresh capital injections. No potential transactions, companies, or amounts have been identified, and PIF has not confirmed any securitization plans.

The backdrop: Gulf IPO activity has been slower this year, and Jefferies flagged tighter liquidity at Saudi banks last month. Those conditions could encourage the fund to widen its funding options, one source said. Stake sales haven’t been straightforward either — differences over pricing and control have emerged as obstacles in early talks with potential investors in some PIF companies, two of the sources told the newswire.

Part of a wider mix: Earlier this month, PIF secured USD 3 bn in financing backed by Italy’s export credit agency Sace and sold 49% of AI company Humain to Aramco, which will put SAR 9.9 bn into the business this year. In September, it completed a 70% stake sale in Al Hilal to Kingdom Holding for SAR 840 mn.

REMEMBER- PIF’s 2026-2030 strategy calls for a larger role for outside investors as its holdings mature. If confirmed, the latest discussions suggest the fund is exploring additional ways to put that approach into practice.

A Saudi-Pakistan PE fund

A new Saudi-Pakistan private equity fund will put three-quarters of its money into Pakistani projects and the rest into Saudi ones, Reuters reports, citing a statement by the Saudi-Pakistan Joint ⁠Business Council. The council launched the fund on Monday, putting its initial size in the several hundreds of mns — without disclosing the currency — and expects it to grow.

The fund adds a private-sector investment channel to a relationship already underpinned by Saudi financing and energy cooperation. Islamabad approved a tax-neutral bonded policy that would let Saudi companies hold commercial crude reserves in Pakistan with no local tax. The two countries also completed the ratification of their defense pact. Riyadh has also extended significant financial support to Islamabad in recent months, including a USD 3 bn loan in April and a three-year extension on a USD 5 bn deposit at its central bank that together equal about 38% of Pakistan’s foreign reserves.

Selling off the damage

The Gulf shipping crisis is throwing up unusual workarounds, like the UAE selling Saudi crude off a damaged tanker. Abu Dhabi has offered around 1.87 mn bbl of Saudi Arab Light from the Gem No. 2, a supertanker struck by an unidentified projectile off the UAE coast last month, and from which a leak was stopped in late October, Reuters reports, citing trade sources and a tender document.

The crude is moving via ship-to-ship transfer, loading between 10 and 20 November, on terms close to Adnoc’s — a source told the newswire that Aramco authorized the UAE to sell it on its behalf, a rare arrangement.

Bob and weave: It is a small but telling sign of how Gulf producers are finding alternative ways to move barrels as attacks on commercial shipping around Hormuz raise freight costs and security risks. Both Saudi Arabia and the UAE have offered buyers freight discounts to keep exports competitive.

For the long game, Saudi Arabia is working to widen its export routes to avoid such threats, with Aramco carrying out engineering work to expand its East-West Pipeline and studying fourth and fifth crude-export corridors on top of the three it already uses. The company plans to maximize oil production in 4Q as it looks to regain market share lost during the conflict.

War Watch

Saudi air defenses intercepted a ballistic missile and a cruise missile launched toward Riyadh, a second ballistic missile aimed at the southern region, and a drone over the eastern region, the Saudi-led coalition said. This came after the Houthis claimed attacks on Aramco’s Abqaiq facility and the King Abdullah Financial District, as well as strikes on Saudi troop concentrations in Al Mudarribah and Ras Al Arah.

Conflicting claims over new East-West pipeline strikes: Saudi Arabia reported that the pipeline was struck in the Medina region, causing a limited fire that was extinguished, with no fatalities or injuries and no effect on operations. Houthi spokesman Yahya Saree called that account a “blatant and enormous lie,” saying the Houthis hit the pipeline in Riyadh, not Medina.

Saudi strikes on Houthis continue: Saree said on X yesterday that the Saudi Air Force carried out 109 airstrikes and missile attacks over the past 24 hours, targeting Sanaa, Marib, Saada, Taiz, Lahj, Amran, and Al Jawf. These strikes bring the total since the escalation began to nearly 4.7k, Saree added.

ICYMI- The coalition destroyed three Houthi sites used to build ballistic missiles: a factory assembling missile components, a chemical plant mixing solid fuel, and a workshop for electronic systems.

LIVin’ ain’t easy

Liv Golf filed a Chapter 11 plan in a New Jersey court yesterday, months after the Public Investment Fund (PIF) wound down its funding. The plan sets out a path to close Liv in an orderly way. Alongside the Chapter 11 plan, Liv Golf proposed holding a final hearing on its disclosure statement on 7 January, which would start the liquidation process, The Associated Press reports.

Liv Golf believes a restructuring is no longer possible. The league pointed to a lack of player participation and BC Partners’ decision to terminate the restructuring support agreement, according to a summary of its bankruptcy plan. Liv Golf laid off 289 staff and furloughed another 22 about a week before it filed for bankruptcy, according to AP. Liv chief executive Scott O'Neil told the Financial Times that the league would need another five to 10 years to turn profitable.

The PIF was done throwing bns of USD at LIV Golf in May, pulling the plug on the breakaway golf league it bankrolled for four years, telling players and staff that funding will stop after the 2026 season wraps up. The fund said “the substantial investment required by Liv Golf over a longer term is no longer consistent with the current phase of PIF’s investment strategy.”

PIF still needs to resolve its remaining commitments: A group of Liv golfers is pushing for severance over unpaid contracts. More than 10 players are trying to negotiate with PIF over contracts worth more than USD 100 mn. PIF sees itself as an equity investor that has stopped investing and is not in talks with players or their counsel. It initially offered players 2 cents on the USD to settle the unpaid contracts.

Data point

22.36 mn tonnes — that’s how much cargo Saudi Arabia’s ports handled in October, down 11.7% y-o-y from 25.32 mn tonnes a year earlier, Saudi Ports Authority (Mawani) said in a statement. Container throughput, however, rose 14% to more than 866k TEUs, with outbound containers up 4.8% and inbound containers up 8.5%. Livestock shipments also climbed 31%, while vessel calls declined 9.6% and passenger numbers fell 9%.

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The big story abroad

China’s trade surplus broke the USD 1 tn mark for the second straight year. The country’s surplus hit USD 1.04 tn over the first 10 months of the year, keeping it on track to top last year’s all-time high of USD 1.2 tn. October exports rose 35.2% from a year earlier, with chips and cars powering this year’s gains, even as Beijing faces growing calls to bring its trade into better balance.

Slovakia calls Germany’s Ukraine-for-budget ultimatum a “textbook case of blackmail.” Slovakia, the Czech Republic, Hungary, and Bulgaria are resisting Berlin’s push to make new Ukraine aid a condition for signing off on the EU’s next long-term budget. Slovakia has threatened to use its veto. Kyiv faces a EUR 70 bn funding gap next year, and Brussels has pledged to cover about EUR 45 bn of it, with a new round of joint EU debt emerging as the leading option.

AI’s power hunger has firms hunting for used turbines and retired jet engines. Wait times for expensive new gas turbines now run into the next decade, pushing utilities, developers, and companies rushing to supply electricity to AI data centers to scour global markets for used units, bring idle machines back into service, and repurpose decommissioned jet engines, Reuters reported yesterday. Appetite for power-intensive data centers keeps climbing even as concerns about AI’s dangers grow and the recent sell-off of related shares, which leaves turbines and other key power equipment in short supply.

Saudi Arabia’s new copyright law could be a boon for Arabic-language models

A new law in Saudi Arabia explicitly allows using copyrighted materials for AI training, giving the Kingdom an edge as a developer of its own AI models. Saudi Arabia joins Japan, the European Union, and Singapore in having adopted specific copyright carveouts for AI training.

The development comes as the Kingdom is vying to become a major player in AI — both as an exporter of computing power and a developer of its own AI models and tools — and competing with the UAE to be the world’s go-to source for Arabic-language AI tools.

The law doesn’t solve all the potential legal problems for Saudi AI models — AI models are increasingly global and copyright regimes vary from country to country, creating potential legal problems for models no matter where they’re trained. But it solves the most pressing legal issues and, just as importantly, it signals that Saudi Arabia is doing serious legal legwork to become a major player in the field.

“It’s not sufficient, but it’s a prerequisite — to at least have a copyright regime that gives you a reasonable argument that you’re not just rampantly infringing bns of people’s rights,” Matthew Sag (LinkedIn), a law professor focused on both AI and copyright issues at Emory University, tells EnterpriseAM.

The move is also likely to be a boon for Arabic-language models and tools. In addition to allowing training with copyrighted Arabic-language works, the law’s implementing regulations lay out a system for Saudi entities to translate works from other languages into Arabic without the explicit consent of the copyright holder — if no Arabic translation has appeared within three years or another specified period. The system isn’t explicitly aimed at model training, but could create a method for producing large quantities of Arabic training content in different dialects.

“Arabic models will be developing at a faster rate because of these developments. This paves the way for Arabic-language models to prosper,” Bachir A. Chakra (LinkedIn), a Riyadh-based attorney with Gowling WLG focused on technology and intellectual property, tells EnterpriseAM. Humain, Saudi’s state-backed AI champion, which is most poised to benefit from the law, did not respond to a request for comment.

Details: The law, which took effect in August, allows developers in Saudi Arabia to train AI models using copyrighted works provided they obtained the work lawfully and don’t use it for anything other than model training. Developers must also log the type, source, purpose, and date of each use.

That limitation also means models can’t reproduce the work after they’re trained on it — something models generally aren’t supposed to do, but sometimes do in error. (As a general matter, AI training is supposed to operate similarly to human learning. When a human reads a novel, it may change how she thinks for years to come, but most humans can’t recite text from novels they’ve read once they’re done.)

International comparison: Laws in the EU, Japan, and Singapore make similar exceptions. In the US, AI companies argue that using copyrighted material to train AI models falls under the “fair use” exception to copyright law — an exception that also allows reproducing portions of copyrighted works in news articles for the purposes of teaching or to satirize them. Some publishers, including The New York Times, disagree and have sued OpenAI, seeking payments for training that uses their copyrighted works.

The trend seems to be that more nations are adopting carveouts or interpreting existing laws to allow training on copyrighted works. “At an international level, what is emerging is a standard of permitted, but always accountable,” Chakra says.

What about the UAE? Current UAE copyright law doesn’t have a carveout for AI model training or a “fair use” doctrine. That hasn’t resulted in any legal problems for the country’s burgeoning AI ecosystem so far, but may not be sustainable — significantly, the nation’s flagship Arabic model, Jais, was trained on servers in California, so the training would fall under US copyright protections.

UAE next? Given the benefits of a specific carveout for model training, Sag predicted the AI-hungry nation would likely update its copyright regime in the next 18 months. The UAE’s Ministry of Economy and Tourism, which oversees copyright protections, did not respond to a request for comment.

Some copyright holders still want a cut. The New York Times sued OpenAI and Microsoft in 2023, claiming the companies violated its copyright by training ChatGPT with its articles. The case hasn’t yet reached trial. In the UK, Getty Images lost a case claiming that Stability AI infringed its copyrights, though its case was weakened because the training happened abroad. The image service is appealing the ruling. “There’s a tension between IP and AI innovation that won’t disappear,” Chakra notes.

There’s also no certainty that Saudi-trained models won’t run into legal troubles in other nations with different copyright laws. Copyright watchers have warned specifically about a provision of the EU’s AI Act, which states that any company offering a general-purpose AI model in the region must comply with EU copyright law regardless of where the model was trained. Saudi models might fall afoul of the EU act because the Saudi law doesn’t contain the same requirements for allowing copyright holders to opt out of data mining.

And yet: AI is developing at such a rapid pace that it makes little sense for AI companies now to worry about the possibility of country-by-country legal fights over copyright issues years down the road — at a point when some AI companies are likely to be so wealthy that any judgment against them would be meaningless and others are likely to be out of business.

Chakra still urges Saudi tech companies to impose safeguards, including ensuring that their models don’t store data after training and allowing copyright holders to expressly opt out from their content being used for AI training.

Priorities: “If I was a Saudi Arabian AI developer, I would just be so much more worried about, ‘Can I make a good model that’s actually competitive?’” rather than focusing on potential future copyright fights, Sag says, adding, “The next box is: Do you have the people? Do you have the talent? Do you have the electricity? Can you get the chips?”

Humain’s getting a big cash infusion from the Saudi National Infrastructure Fund

Humain just got another big check from the state. The National Infrastructure Fund (Infra) will provide the PIF-owned AI company with up to SAR 2.5 bn (USD 667 mn) in financing, according to a press release. The money will pay for AI chips and the power lines to run them.

This is the second time in about a week that a government-owned body has backed the Kingdom’s AI champion. Earlier this month, state oil giant Aramco paid USD 2.6 bn for 49% of the company.

Here’s where the money goes:

Up to SAR 1.1 bn (USD 293 mn) for GPUs, the powerful chips that run AI. That’s enough chips to use about 25 MW of electricity.
Up to SAR 1.4 bn (USD 373 mn) to connect Humain’s data centers to the power grid. That could eventually power up to 1 GW of data centers, 40 times what the new chips will use.

Why so much for power lines? Electricity is a big headache for anyone building data centers. More than half of industry players say power is a major obstacle to getting projects done, according to a survey by the consultancy Turner & Townsend released last month. Across MENA+, the bottleneck in power is more frequently transmission infrastructure than it is generation capacity. In Saudi, the emphasis has been on substations, transmission infrastructure, and grid connections needed to bring future sites online (pdf).

BACKGROUND- These are the first deals under Infra’s AI data center financing program. They build on a non-binding agreement for up to SAR 4.5 bn (USD 1.2 bn) that Infra and Humain announced at Davos in January.

The plan: Infra says it wants to get data center projects off the ground to prove their investment potential to private interests like big cloud companies and major investors. Humain plans to build 3 GW of AI data centers by 2030.

The catch: Humain is entirely state-owned so far. PIF owns 51% of the company and Aramco owns the other 49%. One reading of the Aramco agreement is that Humain may be struggling to attract private investors, as we noted last week.

Oil drives both the fall and the rebound in Saudi industrial production

Saudi’s Industrial Production Index fell 10.9% y-o-y in September — less than half the 23.5% decline in August, as crude production restarted, Gastat data (pdf) shows. Month-to-month, the index jumped 15.6% as crude output recovered from a trough, while non-oil activities remained essentially flat.

The annual decline is concentrated in oil. Oil activities were down 15.5% y-o-y and mining and quarrying 16%, the two drags on the headline, while non-oil activities were essentially flat at plus 0.1%. The base held up elsewhere: electricity and gas rose 6.4% y-o-y and water and waste management 7.3%.

The monthly bounce is the recovery starting. The index rose 15.6% from August, led by oil up 24.7% and mining up 29.9%, as crude production ramped back after a sharp cut caused by attacks on energy facilities and disruption to shipping, Oxford Economics lead economist Akanksha Samdani tells EnterpriseAM; production has since recovered and should lift output toward year-end.

REMEMBER- Saudi crude exports recovered in September, with shipments reaching around 5.4 mn bbl / d, up from 2.45 mn bbl / d in August.

Manufacturing is turning, slowly. The sub-index fell 5.4% y-o-y but gained 2.8% on the month, and here too the drag is oil-linked: coke and refined petroleum products were down 13.6% y-o-y and chemicals 3.8%, while basic metals and beverages grew. Samdani expects limited near-term lift, since most of the manufacturing fall came from oil refining. “As refineries restart, manufacturing output will improve, but this is a return to normal rather than new growth,” she says.

The recovery has a ceiling for now. Samdani expects industrial production to run about 15% below its 2025 level this year. “The risk of further attacks means output is likely to stay below last year’s levels for some time, with a return to growth from the second half of 2027 and a stronger rebound in 2028,” she adds.

What to watch: Non-oil manufacturers still face a hard environment. “Shipping disruption and higher transport and ins. costs make it harder to sell goods abroad, and export orders have fallen for eight months in a row,” Samdani says. Rising input costs and a higher minimum wage for Saudi workers from April 2027 add to the squeeze, and slower construction is denting demand for building materials. Heavier local sourcing and firm domestic demand are the offsets.

Ad weakness and expansion costs push Al Arabia, MBC, and Jahez into the red

Unfinished ad networks deepen Al Arabia’s losses

Outdoor advertising firm Arabian Contracting Services (Al Arabia) saw its 3Q net loss nearly triple y-o-y to SAR 241.9 mn from SAR 82.5 mn, as weaker ad spending collided with the cost of running newly handed-over advertising sites, according to a Tadawul filing. Revenue fell 16.2% to SAR 346.8 mn, gross income swung to an SAR 68 mn loss from an SAR 111.9 mn gain, and operating income turned to an SAR 134.4 mn loss from an SAR 33.5 mn gain.

What’s weighing on the business? Regional geopolitical tensions prompted some clients to cancel advertising campaigns or cut their budgets, hitting revenue. At the same time, Al Arabia is carrying higher lease and depreciation costs on new sites whose wider networks are still incomplete, adding to the pressure on margins.

The YTD picture is dimmer: Al Arabia swung to an SAR 447.5 mn net loss in 9M from net income of SAR 47.2 mn a year earlier, with project-related finance costs adding to the drag. Revenue dropped 25.2% to SAR 1.03 bn. Gross income all but vanished, down 98.5% to SAR 8.1 mn, and operating income turned to an SAR 139.7 mn loss from an SAR 356.8 mn gain. Shareholders’ equity fell 22.4% y-o-y to SAR 1.1 bn.

REMEMBER- Al Arabia rescheduled nearly SAR 1.8 bn in short-term bank debt — roughly half of its SAR 3.52 bn in credit facilities — into medium- and long-term loans in late October, and secured an extra SAR 300 mn facility from Saudi Awwal Bank. The rescheduling came after the reporting period, so the loans will be reclassified as long-term in 4Q.

Al Arabia’s slide slips into MBC’s books

MBC Group sank deep into the red in 3Q 2026 as a markdown on its stake in Al Arabia and a collapse in broadcast advertising overshadowed a turnaround at Shahid. Net loss attributable to shareholders reached SAR 445.3 mn, against an SAR 19.7 mn gain a year earlier, while revenue fell 16.1% y-o-y to SAR 679.8 mn, according to a Tadawul filing and earnings release (pdf).

The group’s stake in Al Arabia did the most damage, while Shahid provided some relief. Investment gains fell SAR 333 mn y-o-y on unrealized fair-value losses, chiefly an SAR 364.6 mn loss on MBC’s investment in Al Arabia. Excluding investment-related movements, MBC says it posted a normalized net loss of SAR 82.7 mn, against normalized net income of SAR 44 mn a year earlier. Meanwhile, Shahid’s revenue rose 10.2% y-o-y to SAR 353 mn on higher subscription income, and its operating income contribution improved by SAR 29 mn as it swung to 3Q net income of SAR 3.2 mn from an SAR 26 mn loss. MBC now expects Shahid to end 2026 in the black, a year earlier than the 2027 break-even it flagged in August.

Advertising is still sliding: Revenue from broadcasting and other commercial activities fell SAR 197 mn as continued geopolitical tensions hit advertising demand and some broadcasting and technical-service contracts ended. The segment’s operating income fell SAR 163 mn, pushing the group to an SAR 49.7 mn operating loss from operating income of SAR 35.8 mn.

Nine-month results tell a similar story: MBC swung to an SAR 509.8 mn net loss attributable to shareholders from SAR 402.6 mn in net income a year earlier, while revenue declined 22.8% to SAR 2.96 bn. Investment gains fell SAR 628 mn, including SAR 575.5 mn in fair-value losses on Al Arabia, and operating income dropped 60.8% to SAR 133.9 mn. Shahid continued to buck the trend, with revenue up 15.9% to SAR 1.18 bn and earnings up SAR 81 mn.

Jahez slips into the red

Food delivery platform Jahez swung to a net loss of SAR 1.9 mn in 3Q from net income of SAR 62.6 mn a year earlier, as fee pressure in Saudi Arabia and launch costs in new markets outweighed a 40.4% jump in revenue to SAR 748.5 mn, according to a Tadawul filing. The revenue growth came from its international platforms, led by Qatar-based Snoonu, which it consolidated in 4Q 2025. Revenue from its Saudi delivery platforms fell 4.7% to SAR 422.8 mn.

Growing, but earning less: Gross merchandise value — the total value of orders placed on its apps — rose 45.2% y-o-y to SAR 2.4 bn in 3Q, driven by a 33.1% increase in orders to 34.7 mn and a 9.1% rise in average order value to SAR 70.2, according to the company’s earnings release (pdf). But gross income rose 8.1% to SAR 143 mn as its gross margin narrowed to 19.1% from 24.8%, and Jahez swung to an operating loss of SAR 12.9 mn from operating income of SAR 42.6 mn.

The biggest hit came at home, where net income from Saudi delivery platforms — the group’s main earner — fell to SAR 47.7 mn from SAR 84.3 mn as competition pushed down delivery fees, alongside a zakat charge this quarter against a credit a year earlier. Abroad, despite the revenue gains, international platforms’ net loss widened to SAR 32.6 mn from SAR 12.8 mn, mainly on launch-phase losses in Kuwait and Oman and new Kuwaiti rules capping merchant commissions and delivery fees, the company said. Losses from other activities also widened to SAR 12.8 mn from SAR 2.5 mn as Jahez restructures Marn, its POS software business.

For 9M 2026, the company reported a net loss of SAR 28.5 mn compared with a net income of SAR 121.5 mn in the same period last year, while revenue increased 37.5% y-o-y to SAR 2.24 bn.

Fast growth, slower earnings for Go Telecom

Etihad Go Telecom’s wholesale business kept revenue growing in 2Q FY 2026/27 (July-September), but rising costs kept its bottom line from keeping pace. Net income rose 10.8% y-o-y to SAR 72 mn, while revenue climbed 19.8% to SAR 563 mn, according to a Tadawul filing. Gross income increased 14.2% to SAR 153 mn, while operating income rose 16.7% to SAR 77 mn.

Wholesale did the heavy lifting as revenue from the segment jumped 53% y-o-y, adding SAR 99 mn, while B2B revenue grew 5%, SAR 11 mn, supported by government and private-sector projects. But costs absorbed most of the gain: Cost of revenue rose SAR 74 mn, eating up most of the SAR 93 mn increase in revenue. Higher selling, marketing, and administrative expenses, together with lower other income, took a further SAR 13 mn, partly offset by an SAR 5 mn cut in expected credit loss provisions. The company tied the higher costs to its expansion, saying efficiency measures helped limit the hit.

The first half shows a similar squeeze: Net income rose 10.2% y-o-y to SAR 140 mn in 1H FY 2026/27, less than half the 22.4% growth in revenue to SAR 1.11 bn, as higher cost of revenue absorbed SAR 169 mn of the SAR 203 mn revenue increase. The gap between revenue and earnings growth was also evident in Go Telecom’s FY 2025/26 results, when net income rose 17.7% against a 31.2% increase in revenue.

Shrinking D360 losses cushion Derayah’s 3Q

Derayah Financial’s bottom line edged higher in 3Q 2026, largely because its share of losses from digital bank D360 narrowed while operating earnings barely grew. Net income increased 5.7% y-o-y to SAR 105.4 mn, while revenue inched up 1.8% to SAR 242.2 mn, according to a Tadawul filing. Operating income was flat, up 0.5% to SAR 138.5 mn, as spending on technology, product development, and marketing lifted operating expenses 3.5% to SAR 103.7 mn.

D360 made the difference: Derayah’s share of the digital bank’s losses narrowed to SAR 30.8 mn from SAR 36.1 mn a year earlier, an SAR 5.3 mn improvement that accounts for most of the SAR 5.7 mn rise in net income. The brokerage committed SAR 100 mn to D360’s capital increase earlier this year, which is expected to reduce its stake in the bank to 16.35% upon completion, from 20.4%.

The 9M picture is weaker: Net income fell 2.7% y-o-y to SAR 303.2 mn, despite revenue growing 4% to SAR 710.8 mn. Operating expenses rose 14.9%, pushing operating income down 3.1% to SAR 399.9 mn. The revenue mix is shifting: Brokerage revenue declined despite a 12% increase in traded value to SAR 383 bn, which Derayah attributed to its introduction of zero-commission trading on Saudi equities and lower margin-financing income. Asset management also fell, which the firm blamed on geopolitical uncertainty delaying several planned fund launches, particularly in real estate. Special commission income helped offset the decline, rising 49% to SAR 206 mn, according to the company’s earnings release (pdf).

DIVIDENDS- Derayah's board approved an SAR 80.75 mn payout for 3Q 2026, equivalent to SAR 0.33 per share, according to a separate Tadawul filing. It will be paid on 25 November to shareholders holding stocks at the close on 16 November.

MIS’ data-center boom comes at a cost

Al Moammar Information Systems (MIS) saw third-quarter net income decline 17.3% y-o-y to SAR 20.8 mn, as the financing and credit provisions that came with its expansion offset a more than threefold increase in revenue to SAR 951.8 mn, up 239% y-o-y. Data-center megaprojects and its ICT core business drove the growth, according to a Tadawul filing.

Where the bottom-line went: The operation itself is scaling cleanly — operating profit rose 64.9% y-o-y to SAR 64.1 mn. The drag sat below the operating line. Finance costs climbed SAR 14.09 mn, tied directly to the data-center mega-projects, while the fair value of investments swung to a SAR 10.5 mn loss from a SAR 6.5 mn gain a year earlier. A SAR 28.4 mn noncash provision for expected credit losses did the rest.

REMEMBER- The build-out’s name is Humain: MIS locked in a fivefold expansion of its data-center contract with Humain in September, lifting planned capacity to 250 MW from an initial 50 MW under an agreement worth around SAR 8.8 bn. It is being executed in phased work orders, with the first four announced by October — the second alone worth more than 1.35x MIS’s full-year 2025 revenue. That contract is the engine behind both the revenue surge and the finance costs now weighing on profit.

The nine-month picture holds the same shape: Revenue rose 88% y-o-y to SAR 1.9 bn and operating profit gained 46.9% to SAR 143.6 mn, yet net income slipped 16.2% to SAR 76.4 mn.

State Street taps Khushaim to lead Saudi, Bahrain

State Street appointed Hamza Khushaim (LinkedIn) as CEO and country head for Saudi Arabia and Bahrain, the company said in a press release. Based in the Kingdom, Khushaim will lead State Street’s growth strategy in both markets and run its locally regulated entity, State Street Saudi Arabia Financial Solutions, as CEO. He joins from Hassana Investment Company, where he was most recently chief strategy officer after a decade at the firm, including a stint as CIO for international markets, and he previously held investment and finance roles at Saudi Aramco. He has 20 years’ experience across investment management, corporate strategy, governance, and financial markets.

IN CONTEXT- The appointment comes as the US investment management giant steps up its Saudi expansion. State Street opened its Riyadh regional headquarters last October and has since secured a Capital Market Authority license to manage investment funds locally. It also plans to roll out Saudi-focused ETFs and custodian services by 2027 to tap the growing ETF demand here at home.

Bank Aljazira plans early redemption of SAR 2 bn sukuk as new offering runs

Aljazira makes the call

Bank Aljazira plans to redeem its entire SAR 2 bn Tier 2 sukuk issuance on 8 December, its first call date five years into its 10-year term, according to a Tadawul filing. The bank has secured regulatory approval to exercise its early redemption option, with investors set to receive the full face value of their holdings plus any outstanding distributions.

REMEMBER- Aljazira launched a separate Tier 2 sukuk offering last week under an SAR 3 bn issuance program. The private placement runs through 6 December, two days before the planned redemption, with the final issuance size and pricing yet to be determined. The bank has not said whether the new offering will refinance the existing sukuk.

Mawsool gets angel backing

Saudi AI-powered sales platform Mawsool has closed a pre-seed investment round backed by 12 angel investors and companies, including T2 founder Abdullah Al-Dosari and Advanced Elements Co, according to a statement. The value of the round was not disclosed.

About Mawsool: Founded in 2023 by Osama Abdelhadi and Adi Ali, Mawsool uses AI-powered virtual agents to identify potential business customers and verify their details before passing leads to sales teams. The company plans to use the investment to accelerate product development and expand across Saudi Arabia and the wider MENA region.

Berkshire called its own stock cheap every quarter of 2026, buying back USD 14.4 bn

Warren Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway has called its own stock cheap every quarter of this year, even as 3Q earnings fell c. 28%. The NYSE-listed conglomerate bought back none of its shares last year, but that changed when Greg Abel took the helm as CEO from Buffett in January. Berkshire repurchased about USD 14.4 bn of its own stock over 9M 2026, with the amounts climbing every quarter, from USD 235 mn in 1Q to USD 4.5 bn in 2Q and USD 9.6 bn in 3Q, according to its quarterly SEC filing.

That’s Berkshire’s own rule: The conglomerate only buys back shares when its CEO (after consulting the chairman) judges the price to be below intrinsic value, conservatively determined, according to the filing. Its share count was still falling through 28 October, the filing’s cover date, a sign the buying continued after the quarter closed. The buying also accelerated through 3Q, with more than half of the quarter’s purchases coming in September at an average of around USD 758k per Class A share, or roughly 1.4x book value by our math.

The USD 9.6 bn was a record for quarterly buybacks, the Financial Times reports. Investors read it as a vote of confidence: Abel is “showing confidence in Berkshire and the prospect of its businesses,” J Stern & Co CIO Christopher Rossbach told the salmon-colored paper. Check Capital’s Chris Ballard told the publication the stock had looked deeply undervalued in recent months.

Over the same quarter, Berkshire was a small net seller of listed equities, Bloomberg reports. Its own stock came first, then a whole company (the USD 6.8 bn Taylor Morrison takeover), and listed equities came last. That’s a sharp turn from 2Q, when heavy stock buying left Berkshire a net buyer of about USD 11 bn of listed equities.

The market is backing the call. Berkshire’s Class A shares closed at a record of around USD 869k last week, The Wall Street Journal reports. The Financial Times says the stock is up 15% this year, against the S&P 500’s 8% total return. Glenview Trust’s Bill Stone told the London daily that investors are treating Berkshire as a flight to safety as tech stocks slide, and he described Abel to the Journal as “more interested in being a better operator than Warren Buffett ever was.”

Ins. weighed on the quarter, while the rest of the group grew. Operating earnings slipped 5.8% to USD 12.7 bn as pre-tax underwriting income fell to USD 1.68 bn from USD 3.16 bn, the filing shows, with its US car ins. arm Geico’s claims costs rising. Ballard told the Associated Press the slowdown was expected as Geico steps up advertising to draw new customers after years of cuts. Elsewhere, railroad earnings rose 19.3%, energy 8.3%, and manufacturing, service, and retail 11.8% — gains the Journal reports some shareholders see as early evidence of Abel’s operator-first approach.

Why it matters: Berkshire is the market’s most-watched buyer of last resort, and its USD 352 bn pile has stayed put through the AI rally. A new CEO who would rather buy back his own stock than anything else on offer is the clearest read yet on what the world’s biggest value investor makes of this market.

What’s next: Berkshire’s 3Q 13F, due 16 November, will show exactly which stocks it trimmed and which it kept. With USD 352 bn still on hand, Stone told the Financial Times that Berkshire would be ready to buy if the AI trade unravels.

MARKETS THIS MORNING-

Asian markets rose earlier today, led by a 1.3% advance in South Korea’s Kospi, an approximate 1% gain in Japan’s Nikkei 225, and a climb of up to 0.8% in the MSCI Asia Pacific Index. Stronger-than-projected earnings from CoreWeave Inc. underpinned the rally and revived interest in the artificial intelligence trade, helping counter an inflation-driven pullback on Wall Street.

TASI	10,168	+0.6% (YTD: -3.1%)
MSCI Tadawul 30	1,379	+0.3% (YTD: -0.6%)
NomuC	21,854	+0.8% (YTD: -6.2%)
USD : SAR (SAMA)	USD 3.75 Sell	USD 3.75 Buy
Interest rates	4.25% repo	3.75% reverse repo
EGX30	52,483	+2.1% (YTD:+25.5%)
ADX	9,556	+0.8% (YTD: -4.4%)
DFM	6,170	+1.4% (YTD: +2.0%)
S&P 500	7,521	-0.4% (YTD: +9.9%)
FTSE 100	10,752	-0.3% (YTD: +8.3%)
Euro Stoxx 50	6,328	+0.6% (YTD: +9.2%)
Brent crude	USD 91.49	-1.2%
Natural gas (Nymex)	USD 3.30	+0.2%
Gold	USD 4,041	+0.3%
BTC	USD 73,825	-1.6% (YTD: -15.7%)
Sukuk/bond market index	894.68	0.0% (YTD: 2.7%)
S&P MENA Bond & Sukuk	149.85	+0.1% (YTD: +1.3%)
VIX (Fear gauge)	19.46	-2.3% (YTD: +30.2%)

THE CLOSING BELL: TADAWUL-

The TASI rose 0.6% yesterday on turnover of SAR 4.9 bn. The index is down 3.1% YTD.

In the green: United Wire Factories (+10.0%), Retal Urban Development (+10.0%), and Mutakamela Ins. (+9.5%).

In the red: Saudi Manpower Solutions (-5.2%), Saudi Energy (-2.6%), and Al Hammadi Holding (-2.6%).

THE CLOSING BELL: NOMU-

The NomuC rose 0.8% yesterday on turnover of SAR 20.7 mn. The index is down 6.2% YTD.

In the green: Keir International (+19.5%), Horizon Educational (+9.6%), and Alwaha REIT Fund (+8.8%).

In the red: Hawyia Auctions (-11.1%), Natural Gas Distribution (-7.5%), and Alfakhera for Mens Tailoring (-7.4%).

CORPORATE ACTIONS-

The Capital Market Authority approved Saudi Cable Company’s request to raise its capital through a SAR 400 mn rights issue, according to a statement. Eligibility will go to shareholders registered with the Depository Center at the close of the second trading day after the general assembly, with the EGM date to be set later. The company will set the offer price and the number of shares after trading ends on the day of the EGM.

CALENDAR

NOVEMBER

11-12 November (Wednesday-Thursday): Aluminum Arabia, The Arena, Riyadh.

29 November-1 December (Sunday-Tuesday): The UN Trade and Development Global Supply Chain Forum, Riyadh.

29 November-1 December (Sunday-Tuesday): The Global Logistics Forum, King Abdulaziz International Convention Centre, Riyadh.

DECEMBER

14-16 December (Monday-Wednesday): The Innovation Driven Water Sustainability Conference (IDWS 2026), Jeddah

2027

JANUARY

6 January (Wednesday): The Transport General Authority’s executive regulations for self-driving passenger transport takes effect.

12-14 January (Tuesday-Thursday): The Future Minerals Forum (FMF), Riyadh.

FEBRUARY

1-3 February (Monday-Wednesday): Energy Regulators Regional Association annual conference, Riyadh.

1-4 February (Monday-Thursday): Cityscape Global, Riyadh Exhibition and Convention Centre (Malham), Riyadh.

MARCH

21-25 March (Sunday-Thursday): The World Water Forum, Riyadh.

22–24 March (Monday-Wednesday): Capital Markets Forum, Four Seasons Hotel, Riyadh

APRIL

26-29 April (Monday-Thursday): World Energy Congress, Riyadh.

JUNE

1-3 June (Tuesday-Thursday): The Saudi Entertainment and Amusement Expo, Riyadh Front Exhibition and Conference Center.

Signposted to happen sometime in 2027:

The Ocean Race finishes in Amaala on the Red Sea;
Riyadh-Kudmi transmission line to be completed;
Aero Middle East and Sand & Fun takes place in Thumamah Airport, Riyadh.

Signposted to happen sometime in 2Q 2027:

The Hail Region Water Networks Project is expected to be completed.
The Esports Nations Cup, Riyadh;

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