News

Arab Monetary Fund releases a study on: Is Climate FinTech Effective in Mitigating Climate Change Risk?

The study aims to investigate the cause-and-effect relationship between the FinTech index and carbon dioxide emissions index globally.

In line with its continuous efforts to support the decision-making process in the Arab countries, the Arab Monetary Fund (AMF) has released a study titled “Is Climate FinTech Effective in Mitigating Climate Change Risk?”.

Global climate change and global warming are typically attributed to human activity, especially after the industrial revolution. There is a growing consensus among climate scientists that Climate FinTech provides great potential to protect the environment and mitigate climate change risks. In this paper, we investigate the cause-and-effect relationship between the FinTech index and carbon dioxide emissions index globally. In doing so, Granger causality test and Wavelet coherence analysis are employed to evaluate this association using daily frequency data over a period of 30 June 2015 to 31 December 2021.

The Arab Monetary Fund and the Arab Gulf Programme for Development sign a memorandum of understanding to coordinate efforts to promote financial inclusion

The Arab Monetary Fund and the Arab Gulf Programme for Development sign a memorandum of understanding to coordinate efforts to promote economic development and achieve sustainable development goals in the Arab region via expanding financial inclusion

Emphasis on supporting the successful implementation of the comprehensive economic reform program signed between the Arab Monetary Fund and the Government of Yemen

The Arab Monetary Fund (AMF) and The Arab Gulf Programme for Development (AGFUND) signed a memorandum of understanding on Wednesday, December 28, to promote economic development and achieve sustainable development goals in the Arab region through boosting financial inclusion and enhancing the role of the financial inclusion. The MOU will focus on supporting micro, small and medium-sized agricultural projects, and digital financial transformation, which contributes to accelerating the economic growth and creating job opportunities in the region, in addition to supporting legislations and supervisions of the financial systems including microfinance. 

The Arab Monetary Fund publishes Guidance Note on “Adopting Smart Contracts and their Legal Enforceability in Arab Countries”

Advantages of adopting smart contracts across different sectors in Arab countries

Assessment of opportunities and risks arising from the implementation of smart contracts for participants and markets

The Arab Monetary Fund (AMF) issued today Monday, December 19th, 2022, a guidance note on “Adopting Smart Contracts and their Legal Enforceability in Arab Countries” prepared by members of the Arab Regional Fintech Working Group (WG), of which the AMF acts as the technical secretariat. This note stems from the AMF's endeavours to promote awareness of the opportunities and risks of adopting smart contracts in various industries in the Arab countries.

ARPCSO (Buna) and The Benefit Company (BENEFIT) Sign Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) to Facilitate Cross-border Payments via Buna and Fawri+

Under the patronage of H.E Rasheed Mohammed Al Maraj, Governor of the Central Bank of Bahrain, and H.E Dr. Abdulrahman Bin Abdullah Al Hamidy, Chairman of the Board of The Arab Regional Payments Clearing and Settlement Organization (ARPCSO)

Abu Dhabi, December 8th, 2022: In a ceremony hosted by the Arab Monetary Fund (AMF), Mr. Abdulwahed AlJanahi,  Chief Executive of BENEFIT, the operator of the national electronic payment systems in the Kingdom of Bahrain, and Mr. Mehdi Manaa, Chief Executive Officer of Buna, the cross-border payment system operated by Arab Regional Payments Clearing and Settlement Organization “ARPCSO”, owned by AMF,  signed today a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) to establish a framework of cooperation between Buna and BENEFIT.  The ceremony was held under the patronage of H.E Rasheed Mohammed Al Maraj, Governor of the Central Bank of Bahrain, and H.E Dr. Abdulrahman Bin Abdullah Al Hamidy, Chairman of the Board of ARPCSO.

Joint Arab initiative to launch cross-border payment service for pensioners in the Arab world via Buna

The first phase includes the Republic of Iraq, the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan, and the Arab Republic of Egypt

The service aims to support financial inclusion and enhance the user experience by utilizing Buna platform to improve the efficiency of pension payments

The Central Bank of Iraq, the Central Bank of Jordan, the Central Bank of Egypt, and Buna, the cross-border payment system operated by Arab Regional Payments Clearing and Settlement Organization “ARPCSO”, owned by the Arab Monetary Fund, announced a joint Arab initiative to launch cross-border payment service for pensioners in the Arab world utilizing the Buna system.

Buna holds its 38th virtual workshop

Updates on industry developments, and latest progress regarding G20 roadmap for enhancing cross border payments

A major step towards building the instant payment hub for the Arab world will be announced at the occasion of this workshop

Abu Dhabi, December 7th, 2022: Buna (the cross-border payment system operated by Arab Regional Payments Clearing and Settlement Organization “ARPCSO”, owned by The Arab Monetary Fund “AMF”), holds on Thursday December 8th its monthly workshop number 38 to share updates on its strategic initiatives and other key industry developments.

The workshop will be hosting high-level guest speakers from various organizations, it will be the occasion to announce another key step and strategic partnership supporting Buna’s efforts towards building the instant payment hub for the Arab world and beyond.

The workshop will also host Bank of New York Mellon to shed light on the state of real-time payments in the US and other markets.

The Kingdom of Saudi Arabia extends a billion US dollar to support the Republic of Yemen’s comprehensive economic, financial and monetary reform program, with technical assistance from the Arab Monetary Fund (AMF)

The Kingdom of Saudi Arabia extends a billion US dollar to support the Republic of Yemen’s comprehensive economic, financial and monetary reform program, with technical assistance from the Arab Monetary Fund (AMF)

The program covers the period (2022-2025), and aims at establishing economic and financial stability in the Republic of Yemen, enhancing fiscal stability and the external position, rebuilding Yemeni institutions and supporting their governance and transparency, in order to enhance the macroeconomic environment to expand and diversify the productive base, support inclusive and sustainable economic growth, and create job opportunities. The program is expected to help put the Yemeni economy on a sustainable path, and support the course of economic and social development, while reducing unemployment and poverty rates.

The program focuses on reform package aiming at strengthening the fiscal position of the Yemeni government, developing the financial and banking sector, and creating an enabling environment to enhance the role of the private sector while scaling up its role in achieving sustainable economic development.

Arab Monetary Fund extends a new Ordinary Loan to the Republic of Tunisia, with an amount of Arab Accounting Dinar 19.175 million, the equivalent of approximately USD 74 million, in face of current circumstances

The Arab Monetary Fund (AMF) extended a new Ordinary Loan to the Republic of Tunisia, with the amount of Arab Accounting Dinar 19.175 million, the equivalent of approximately USD 74 million. The loan agreement was signed on Friday, November 4, 2022, by HE Dr.

The AMF follows closely the developments of the Tunisian economy and the challenges it faces due to the current global circumstances and works through a fruitful partnership with the Tunisian government to help the country address the different challenges in the most effective way, as the Tunisian economy witnessed positive developments during 2022, recording actual growth rates of about 2.4 percent and 2.8 percent for the first and second quarters of the aforementioned year, respectively, driven by the recovery of the agricultural sector,  increased phosphate production, the growth of the manufacturing sector, especially the textiles, clothing and leather industries, and improvement in tourism revenues and remittances of the Tunisians expatriates.

Arab Monetary Fund releases a study on “Implications of Capital Inflows on financial stability in Arab countries”

Capital inflows may have a negative long run impact on financial stability

It is better to stay away from debt inflows as they might have a negative effect on financial stability

In line with its continuous efforts to support the decision-making process in the Arab countries, the Arab Monetary Fund (AMF) has released a study titled “Implications of Capital Inflows on financial stability in Arab countries”. This study sheds the light on the effect of capital inflows, whether it is direct investment or portfolio investment or other investments, on financial stability on a set of Arab countries and provides analytical framework for Arab countries that help them in improving their efforts in enhancing financial stability.

In this context, paper investigates the impact of net capital inflows on credit to the private sector as a share of gross domestic product. It tries to assess to what extent net capital inflows could lead to excessive credit growth and, hence, undermine financial stability. The results show that net capital inflows may have a negative long run impact on financial stability in the Arab countries through increasing credit growth.

The Arab Regional Payments Clearing and Settlement Organization (ARPCSO) and Egyptian Banks Company (EBC) Sign Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) to Facilitate Cross-border Payments via Buna and Instant Payment Network (IPN)

The MoU aims to create cross-border instant payments interoperability between Egypt and other markets

Buna is progressing with its plans to be a strategic hub that links national instant payment solutions from the Arab region and beyond

Abu Dhabi, 27 October 2022: In a ceremony hosted by the Arab Monetary Fund, Mr. Tarek Raouf,  Chief Executive Officer of Egyptian Banks Co. for Technological Advancement (EBC), a payment system operator owned by the Central Bank of Egypt, and a group of commercial banks, and Mr. Mehdi Manaa, CEO of Buna, the cross-border payment system operated by Arab Regional Payments Clearing and Settlement Organization “ARPCSO”, owned by The Arab Monetary Fund “AMF”,  signed today a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) putting in place a framework of cooperation between Buna and EBC.  The ceremony was held in the AMF headquarter in Abu Dhabi, UAE, under the patronage of H.E Dr. Abdulrahman A. Al Hamidy, Director General Chairman of the Board of the Arab Monetary Fund.