United Arab Emirates

Drydocks World, a Dubai-based shipbuilding and repair company, is threatening to seek a legal ruling from a special tribunal here to overcome lenders' opposition to its $2.2 billion debt-restructuring plan, according to people familiar with the matter, The Wall Street Journal reported. Drydocks may apply as soon as Monday to the Dubai World Tribunal seeking legal backing for its debt-restructuring plan, which has been approved by the majority of Drydocks' lenders but is still being opposed by a few creditors including a number of hedge funds, according to two of the people.

Abu Dhabi has discussed a £10bn investment into Royal Bank of Scotland, as part of a complex transaction that would help pave the way for the government’s eventual exit, the Financial Times reported. The investment has been debated in the course of long-running talks between UK government officials and potential investors in both RBS and Lloyds, Britain’s two big part-nationalised banks. The discussions have taken place at regular intervals over the past three years, according to people close to the discussions.

DP World, the Dubai government-controlled port operator, said Monday it will reach into its cash reserves to pay back $3 billion in debt half a year early, the Associated Press reported. The move will shrink the company's debt load by nearly 40 percent while still leaving it with more than $1 billion in cash on hand, according to company figures. DP World's ability to borrow billions to fund an aggressive overseas expansion helped it become the world's third largest port operator.

Drydocks World LLC, the Middle East’s biggest ship repair company, said it’s proposing to repay loans over five years as part of a plan to restructure $2.2 billion of debt, Bloomberg reported. Drydocks World presented the terms of its proposal and the steps required to implement it along with the associated timeline to all its syndicated lenders in Dubai today. The company said it’s confident it can get support for the plan.

Drydocks World LLC plans to present next week the terms to restructure $2.2 billion of debt as the global credit crisis forces Dubai’s state-linked companies to alter terms on loan repayments, Bloomberg reported. Drydocks World, a unit of state-controlled Dubai World, will on March 8 “present the terms of its proposal and the steps required to implement it along with the associated timeline to all its syndicated lenders,” the company said in an e-mailed statement today.

More than two years after the Dubai debt crisis erupted, the restructuring of corporate debts remains in legal limbo as it is unclear how banks can get back their money from government-linked enterprises in the Gulf state, Reuters reported. The impasse, which is aggravated by deficient bankruptcy legislation, is finally pushing some banks to lose patience and consider legal action. But their tougher stance is being matched by a hardening of the government's attitude to bailing out state-linked entities, raising the risk of further delays in completing these restructurings.

The UAE’s insolvency laws have been in force since 1993 but lawyers are hard pressed to come up with a single example of their being used to wind down a struggling company. Untested and widely regarded as unworkable, they are in bad need of replacement, the Financial Times beyondbrics blog reported. The juddering impact of the global financial crisis has persuaded the government to draft a new set of regulations, which will hopefully allow companies to conduct orderly wind-downs through the courts. It won’t be easy.

A potential $2.2 billion debt restructuring for Drydocks World, the shipbuilding arm of indebted Dubai World, is seen facing tough headwinds with the presence of hedge funds and a lack of government aid seen threatening an amicable deal, Reuters reported. Drydocks has set up a committee to thrash out an agreement for the restructuring of its $2.2 billion debt pile. The firm missed a payment deadline for a $1.7 billion three-year loan facility that it took in October 2008. It also has another five-year $500 million facility on the restructuring table.

The UAE is in the final stages of framing regulations on insolvency, foreign investment and arbitration, Dr Hadef Bin Jua'an Al Daheri, the UAE Minister of Justice, has told Gulf News. Speaking ahead of the International Bar Association Annual Conference (IBA), which opened in Dubai yesterday, Al Daheri said that the UAE's legal environment has become a role model for the region. "There are some laws that are under study and these include the arbitration law, the foreign investment law and the insolvency law, as well as others.

Two years after the Dubai debt crisis erupted, contributing to a wave of loan restructurings across the Gulf, those restructurings may be entering a more difficult phase as banks become reluctant to extend maturities further, the Kuwait Times reported. Government-related and private companies in the region have so far avoided defaults by agreeing with creditors to push out maturities-a process labelled "extend and pretend" by some cynical bankers. This method has helped banks avoid billions of dollars in writedowns and companies to avoid the shame of defaulting.