MENA Asset Management Survey 2012 - National Bank of Abu Dhabi

United Arab Emirates
Dubai International Financial Centre (DIFC)
Assets under management by companies based in DIFC amounted to US$ 8.6
billion (+21% from 2011) at the end of September 2012. Domestic fund assets stood
at US$ 309 million and foreign fund assets stood at US$ 2.4 billion. Assets under
management in portfolios amounted to US$ 5.9 billion. Two public funds and seven
exempt funds are currently domiciled in DIFC. In 2011, there were 1,807 funds being
marketed in or through the DIFC by 54 fund promoters. Of these, 1,381 were designated,
334 were in the ‘other foreign fund criteria’ category (formerly titled ‘non-designated’). In
2010, DFSA introduced two additional categories including recommendation based
offers and the equivalent of the DFSA exempt fund criteria. In 2011, 61 funds were
marketed in the DIFC under the first of these and the latter enabled the marketing of 28
funds. The remaining 3 funds marketed in 2011 were domestic. Designated funds are
those where the fund is established and operated in a recognised jurisdiction as per
DFSA's notice and the fund is a designated fund as specified in the notice. Other Foreign
Fund Criteria captures those funds not able to meet the above criteria, but where the
custody and investment management activities are undertaken by entities acceptable to
DFSA e.g. based and regulated in a recognised jurisdiction. Following the introduction of
a new Exempt Funds regime in 2010, existing Private Funds had to convert to either
Public or Exempt Funds by the end of a transitional period in July 2012.
Assets Under Management at DIFC
(US$ billion, end of period)
Fund Assets Portfolios Total
Institutional Clients
Discretionary
High Net Worth &
Private Accounts
Foreign Funds
DIFC Funds
2011 - - - - 7.1
Sep-2012 0.309 2.4 4.1 1.8 8.6
Source: DFSA
336