Brookfield + Alshaya Group form Dubai Hills JV and Apis Partners closes USD 1.23 bn third fund

Banks, investors, and global financial services firms are all on a strong business-as-usual footing as the week draws to a close. PIF priced a three-part USD bond yesterday into more than USD 216 bn of demand (we have more above). FAB followed with the first international GCC sukuk since the war started — twice oversubscribed at 85 bps over US Treasuries. Ta’ziz closed USD 2 bn for its Ruwais methanol plant from 11 banks across Europe and Asia (including our friends at Mashreq), taking Make it in the Emirates from talking point to syndicated paper. And Brookfield and Alshaya signed a JV for a big mixed-use development in Dubai Hills in the same week Dubai real estate and GCC retail were supposed to be the sectors carrying the heaviest war discount.

UP FIRST- Brookfield Asset Management and Alshaya Group are forming a JV for a 480k sq ft mixed-use development in Dubai Hills, including Grade A office, build-to-rent residential, and retail in a single site, per a press release. Brookfield Properties is leading development, with Alshaya anchoring the office and integrating its retail brands across the site. Brookfield is one of the world’s largest alternative asset managers, with c. USD 1 tn AUM and a real estate book in the same conversation as Blackstone. Alshaya is the Kuwait-headquartered family-owned franchise operator behind Starbucks, H&M, Mothercare, and dozens of other Western brands in MENA+, with c. 85k employees on the ground.

Why it matters: A big global allocator coming in during the middle of a war shock — even as some Dubai developer bonds — is the latest in a string of data points suggesting global capital is looking beyond the war and sees the UAE’s long-term potential. The split between top-tier and mid-tier Dubai real estate is widening, and a Brookfield-Alshaya project at Dubai Hills sits cleanly on the top-tier side of the line.

Apis Partners has closed its third fund at USD 1.23 bn — more than double its predecessor, it said in a statement — a vote of confidence in the London-based PE firm’s sector-focused bet on tech-enabled financial services. Existing LPs accounted for around half of the capital raised. New backers include sovereigns, supranationals, banks, insurers and pension funds. Apis has already deployed around USD 400 mn from Fund III across seven investments, including UK digital wealth manager MoneyBox, prepaid digital goods platform Coda Recharge, and Singapore-headquartered cross-border payments firm Thunes.

Closing a fund of this size in a year of regional war is no small thing. “Closing 23% above target and with over 70% of our existing investors increasing their commitments, this is a clear reflection of the confidence our diversified LP base places in our sector-specific strategy and our ability to generate returns,” our friend Hossam Abou Moussa, partner at Apis, told us. The firm ranked second globally — and was the highest-ranked European PE firm — in the 2025 HEC Paris–Dow Jones Growth Equity Investor Ranking.

MENA+ is central to Apis’ thesis. Fund III is continuing to back MNT-Halan, the Egyptian-born fintech Apis first invested in in 2021 and which now operates across Egypt, Turkey, Pakistan, and the UAE. “This partnership is a living example of why we remain deeply committed to Egypt and the broader region,” Hossam said. “The talent is here, the ambition is here, the progressive regulatory framework is here and the opportunity to build world-class financial infrastructure businesses is as compelling as anywhere in the world.”

Saudi’s Fakeeh Care signed binding terms to acquire 100% of Dr. Mohammed Bin Rashed Al Fagih & Partners for SAR 1.6 bn in cash, financed through a mix of self-funding and bank debt, per its Tadawul disclosure. Dallah Healthcare exits with SAR 498 mn for its 31.21% stake — its own disclosure here. The target: a single 350-bed multi-specialty Riyadh hospital that swung from a SAR 73 mn loss in 2023 to SAR 48 mn net income in 2025 on revenue up 24% to SAR 466 mn. PwC and White & Case advised.

Why it matters: Combined with Fakeeh’s existing 185-bed Riyadh facility, the deal builds a 535-bed two-site cluster — the kind of footprint impossible to construct organically in a market where Dallah, NMC, Sulaiman Al Habib, and Mouwasat are all running parallel consolidation plays. Saudi healthcare M&A is the cleanest pure-play we’ve got on the Health Sector Transformation Program.

Saudi VCs are doubling down while foreign funds pull back, per Bloomberg. Khwarizmi Ventures has lined up over USD 70 mn for the first close of its second fund and is already deploying. Sharaka Capital is preparing a USD 30 mn vehicle on top of SAR 350 mn AUM. Sadu is targeting USD 70 mn this year, heading to USD 100 mn AUM by year-end.

State-backed entities are key to this: They now make up roughly a third of Khwarizmi’s investor mix, where foreign investors accounted for 29% of Saudi venture funding in 2025. The MENA venture market was flat at USD 799 mn in 1Q per Magnitt, with international participation continuing to drag.

We saw a torrent of earnings this week, with regulated and infrastructure-style companies taking in stride the hit to their March results from the war in the Gulf. Saudi Energy reported net income up89% y-o-y bn on a growing regulated asset base, while the UAE’s Parkin turned in a record AED 185.1 mn in net profit and is pushing ahead with its dividend plan. Emirates Group recorded strong FY 2025-2026 net income and says about three-quarters of its capacity is already restored, while Saudi insurer Tawuniya grew its bottom line 10.1% and said it’s going to ramp up investments in AI.

The other side of the line: Saudi Ground Services saw net income down38.1% on a softer Umrah window, KSA pharmacy player Nahdi saw a 7.6% drop in net profit on expansion costs. Savola buffered its bottom line with proceeds with the one-off gain from its exit of Sudan.

First Abu Dhabi Bank tapped international markets on Wednesday for a USD 700 mn five-year senior unsecured sukuk, twice oversubscribed, per Zawya. It’s the first international Islamic bond out of the GCC since the war escalated. The notes priced at 85 bps over US Treasuries, tightened from 115 bps in initial guidance, with a reoffer yield of 4.859%. That was flat-to-negative against FAB’s secondary curve, but still 25 bps wider than its USD 750 mn senior issuance in January.

Why this matters: Emirates NBD took an AT1 to market last week — which tightened to 6.25% from 6.75% on strong demand — and the message is consistent: investment-grade GCC paper is attractive, and issuers are willing to pay a modest standoff premium rather than wait for spreads to fully reset.

Al Rajhi Capital’s Indirect Financing Fund 4 was fully subscribed in one week, raising over SAR 1.3 bn to invest in personal financing contracts from a Sama-licensed firm, according to a press release. The private closed-end fund, which secured an AA+ credit rating, is designed to provide monthly distributions over a three-year term at a medium risk level, extendable for two additional one-year periods.

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