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32 The Investor

Industry Budgeted Exp. (US $ million) No. of projects
Construction 122,540 280
Oil 100,189 67
Transport 93,245 111
Power 46,960 81
Gas 17,683 25
Water 8,672 35
Chemical 7,565 3
Industrial 685 7
Grand Total 397,539 609
Source: MEED Projects, KAMCO Research
Note : Figures include projects under study and in the pre-execution stage

In terms of project pipeline, Saudi Arabia country. In addition, according to the IMF,
leads the region owing of its sheer size Kuwait is the only country in the GCC that
with projects worth more than a trillion is expected to report fiscal surplus in 2017
dollars in pipeline followed by the United (3.2% of GDP) as against deficits for the
Arab Emirates with US $853 billion worth rest of the countries.
of projects. Kuwait’s project pipeline
stood at US $257 billion or 10% of the We believe that the aforementioned factors
total GCC pipeline of US $2.65 trillion. along with an ongoing average oil price
Notably, while Qatar and UAE reported
bigger project pipelines, we believe that
while a majority of these projects are
event-driven (for the FIFA World Cup 2022
and Expo 2020), Kuwait’s project market
caters to the current and future needs of
the economy and is not driven by any
major event in the future.

In terms of industry split, construction
projects continue to account for the lion’s
share of total value of the projects at
close to US $122 billion split across 280
projects. The oil sector accounted for 25%
of the total with US $100 billion spread
across 67 projects.
Kuwait’s appetite for investing in new
projects is much stronger than the rest of
the GCC countries owing to the surpluses
that the country has accumulated over the
years. This was also reflected in projects
awarded during 2016 which stood at US
$14 billion despite the fall in oil prices.
The country also has the lowest breakeven
oil price estimated at US $47.7 per barrel
for fiscal year 2017 as against the price
assumption of US $45 per barrel used in
estimating the 2017/18 budget for the

Issue 1 October 2017