Saudi leads way in Gulf boom

摘要

The world's largest independent power and water project (IWPP) reached its financial close on June 21. Unusually, it was not the Gulf's project finance hotspot, Qatar, that sewed up the deal, but Saudi Arabia, when a syndicate of 29 banks extended limited recourse lending worth $3.44bn to the Marafiq IWPP in Jubail on the east coast. The market believes many more such deals will follow in the conservative kingdom.