Qatar seeks to support its financial markets

Qatar could introduce new measures to help support its financial markets amid the global downturn, its central bank governor said on Monday.

“I think there is more in our plan to stabilise and to make the financial market and industry more stable and sound,” Al Thani said in an interview with Bloomberg at a central bank governors meeting in Basel, Switzerland. He did not say what measures would be taken.

In May, Qatar said that it would buy back real estate investments worth as much as $4.1bn from local banks.

“What we have been doing is a precautionary plan,” Al Thani told the newswire. “There are a lot of measures to make the financial assets and real estate more sound, so that the banks can act freely and lend freely.”

He added that some Qatari banks hold loans from the Saudi conglomerate, Ahmad Hamad Algosaibi & Brothers Co, whose Bahraini banks has defaulted and which reportedly owes $9.bn to more than 100 banks.

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