Good morning, friends, and happy FRIDAY. We’ve made it to the end of February, which admittedly flew by, and are now one third of the way into Ramadan. We close out the month — and week — with a packed issue, led by a USD 3 bn debt issuance from Abu Dhabi (its first this year).

The USD 3 bn bonds come just a few days after JPMorgan said it plans to remove the UAE from its emerging market bond indexes, given its cost of living and per capita income are now much more at par with developed markets. This means that in just a couple of months’ time, its debt will be priced similar to those markets as well.

Abu Dhabi is now capitalizing on the brief time it has left on the EM indices, securing competitive pricing before it starts getting benchmarked against more competitive developed markets.

Also on the debt front: Omniyat tapped debt markets once again with a USD 600 mn sukuk, and Commercial Bank of Dubai greenlit debt plans for the year ahead.

It’s also a busy day for M&A, with Dubai Aerospace Enterprise acquiring mega lessor Macquarie AirFinance in a USD 7 bn transaction, while Spain’s Exus Renewables acquired a majority stake in Masdar’s Portuguese wind portfolio. And in other energy news: Adnoc seems to still be circling Australia’s LNG assets after the failed Santos bid, with talks taking place for a stake in Shell’s LNG project in the country.

WEATHER- The mercury is peaking at 28°C in Dubai and 26°C in Abu Dhabi, while Dubai will see a low of 20°C and the capital will see a low of 18°C.

CORRECTION- In yesterday’s edition of EnterpriseAM, we mistakenly reported that Zoho is building more data centers in the UAE and Saudi Arabia. A spokesperson from the company has clarified that the company does not actively build data centers but rather runs, manages, and operates them and inks colocation agreements to offer the physical infrastructure needed. It has also not engaged Equinix for any new data centers, though the firm serves as their selected colocation provider.

Watch this space

ENERGY — Adnoc eyes Shell’s Australian LNG stake: Adnoc’s investment arm XRG is in preliminary talks with Shell to acquire a stake in the North West Shelf liquefied natural gas (LNG) project in Australia, Bloomberg reports, citing sources familiar with the matter. While discussions are in the early stages and Shell is currently speaking with other potential buyers, the agreement would involve a slice of Australia’s oldest and second-largest LNG export facility. Shell first floated the sale of a c.USD 3 bn stake in the plant back in September.

Adnoc is not the only regional heavyweight eyeing the asset. MidOcean Energy — which is backed by Saudi Aramco — is also in the running for the Shell stake, according to the business news information service. Through MidOcean, Saudi Aramco already holds indirect stakes in several Australian LNG projects, including Gorgon, Queensland Curtis, and Pluto.

Why it matters: Following its stake acquisition in the Rio Grande LNG project in the US last year, a move into Australia would give the UAE state energy giant a strategic foothold in the Asia Pacific market — the world’s primary destination for LNG. With Argentinian LNG also on the horizon, the move signals that Adnoc is expanding its presence in the global gas market, competing directly with global peers for long-term supply security. This also comes after Adnoc abandoned what would’ve been a record bid for Australian group Santos last year.

What’s next: Watch for the valuation and the size of the stake. The North West Shelf project is a complex joint venture with multiple partners — including Woodside Energy and BP — so any entry by Adnoc will require navigating a sophisticated web of existing shareholder agreements.

INFRASTRUCTURE — Dubai awards AED 2.5 bn in contracts for drainage infrastructure: Dubai Municipality awarded five new project contracts worth AED 2.5 bn as part of the second phase of its Tasreef rainwater drainage program, according to Dubai Media Office. The contracts were inked with international firms DeTech Contracting and China State Construction Engineering.

The details: Key infrastructure developments include building a tunnel connecting communities along Sheikh Mohammed bin Zayed Road and Al Yalayis Road to the primary drainage network, and a 27-km drainage network between Sheikh Zayed Road and Al Jamayel Street.

Background: Dubai has been looking to reinforce its water drainage infrastructure after severe storms and heavy rainfall caused intense road and property damage in April 2024. The emirate issued AED 1.4 bn in contracts for four major projects to mitigate flood threats. The USD 22 bn sewage tunnel project is set to comprise over 70 km of main tunnels and 140 km of supporting infrastructure.

AI — US signals approval of G42’s security steps for AI chips: US State Undersecretary for Economic Growth Jacob Helberg signaled the US’ satisfaction and support so far for state AI firm G42’s efforts to safeguard supplies of US AI chips and ensure proper use, AGBI reports, citing Helberg’s comments at a congressional hearing.

ICYMI- Earlier this week, G42 said it was building systems to track the “export, deployment, and stewardship” of next-generation US semiconductors in G42’s AI data centers, ensuring usage aligns with US export rules.

Helberg stressed G42’s past ties to China have been severed and said the UAE has taken verifiable steps to address prior concerns about access to sensitive US technology. He added that the initiative could scale across the rest of the US’ Pax Silica coalition, launched earlier this year as a framework to secure supply chains for artificial intelligence.

BACKGROUND- The update comes after the US gave the greenlight last October to export several USD bns worth of Nvidia chips to the UAE for use in US-linked AI infrastructure. That approval was expanded in November to include exporting 35k Nvidia Blackwell chips to G42 under the condition of certain security assurances.

PARKING — Parkin proposes tariff hike to close pricing gap: Dubai’s parking operator Parkin submitted a formal request to the Roads and Transport Authority to increase the average public parking tariff, including seasonal cards, Gulf News reports. The request seeks to align permit rates with the variable pricing system introduced in April.

Why are seasonal cards under review? The review looks to eliminate pricing arbitrage that emerged last year. Since seasonal card rates remained fixed, regular commuters flocked to permits to avoid higher daily fees. In 4Q 2025, the company’s seasonal card sales soared 140%, reaching 89k units.

AND- The parking operator is carving out more room to meet its 2026 revenue target, planning to add as many as 7.5k new parking slots over the course of the year, a 3.9% increase from its current public parking portfolio, according to a press release.

The big story abroad

The battle for Warner Bros Discovery has reached a dramatic end, with Netflix walking away from its bid for the Hollywood studio and streaming giant, paving the way for Paramount to acquire the firm. The reason? Netflix couldn’t match Paramount’s renewed hostile bid, which lured Warner Bros back to the negotiating table last week. “We've always been disciplined, and at the price required to match Paramount Skydance's latest offer, the deal is no longer financially attractive, so we are declining to match the Paramount Skydance bid," Netflix said in a statement.

REMEMBER- Paramount’s USD 31-a-share offer is backed by Larry Ellison, co-founder and chief technology officer of Oracle and father of Paramount CEO David Ellison. It was also backed by Gulf sovereign wealth funds, including Saudi Arabia's PIF, Qatar Investment Authority (QIA), and Abu Dhabi's L'imad Holding Co.

Also making headlines: Claude maker Anthropic has refused to offer up its technology to the US military after US defense secretary Pete Hegseth threatened to cut the firm from Pentagon supply chains or have its tech co-opted if it does not allow the defense department control over the technology.

Plus: More trouble in private credit land? A large credit fund managed by KKR plunged after reporting a surge in troubled loans and cut its dividend amid lower interest rates and losses. This follows a decline in private markets groups in recent weeks due to concerns around investor redemptions and rising credit losses, including at Blue Owl.

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