Today before the bell, The Fight Zone announced that Robert Drysdale, winner of the Abu Dhabi championship and virtually every other jujitsu championship in the world, has turned to a professional career in MMA. He has coached former UFC Heavyweight Champion Frank Mir on Spike TV’s “The Ultimate Fighter” and is the head Brazilian Ju-Jitsu instructor at UFC Heavyweight Champion Randy Couture’s training facility, XtremeCouture.

Lloyd Vickers, President and CEO of The Fight Zone, Inc., commented, “We expect Robert to become a dominating force within the world of mixed martial arts. We see few fighters that will be able to match his grappling skills. We welcome him to the professional ranks of the world’s fastest growing sport.”

Skip Kelp, Executive Director of The Fight Zone and Robert Drysdale’s coach, stated, “For the past few years Robert has almost completely dominated the world of Ju-Jitsu. His

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Sara Nunnally says Middle Eastern states are using their petro-dollar Sovereign Wealth Funds to boost their international profile and reduce dependence on oil. She says “following the money” is a good way for investors to profit from this shift in global economic and financial power.

This from Taipan Publising’s emerging market blog:

Last Tuesday, I told Taipan Publishing Group subscribers in Taipan Insider that one Middle Eastern country was injecting massive amounts of cash into international markets.

That’s not really news nowadays, though, is it? Everyone’s heard of the $7.5 billion Citigroup (NYSE:C) bailout by Abu Dhabi back in November 2007.

But things have noticably been slowing down. When billions of dollars worth of investments get halved in value in less than a year, it makes you think.

Yet for some regions, this credit crunch is an opportunity of a lifetime.

Think about it. You’re an oil-rich nation with foreign currency

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Consumer shows spooky signs of weakness… recession now unavoidable? How’s your 401(k)? Some scary stats on the average retirement savings plan. Haunting mortgage data… 10 million Americans suffer “negative equity”. U.S. finance capitalism dead or dying… Byron King on the new paradigm for global economic power. Eric Fry on investing during the post-crash bounce. Plus, one “surefire” sector during these frightening times.

Boo!

We begin today with a Halloween hypothetical: If you’re a mainstream economist or financial journalist, what’s the scariest possible scenario that could arise from an economic crisis?

Answer: That the ephemeral specter of the American consumer, whose purchases now make up over 70% of economic activity in I.O.U.S.A., would stop spending.

Uh-ho. In the third quarter

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This morning, we our reprinting Currency Currents past from 28 August 2007; it’s the “best of Currency Currents” if you will.

What is interesting is that our top key news event back on 28 Aug ‘07 was Barclays, a UK bank that is in the news again today after sealing a deal to obtain funds from a couple of places that still have some—Abu Dhabi and Qatar. 

We particular liked this old issue because it lays out a thought process to help shield us from a world chock-full of guru-ism, which is always a danger to one’s trading account.  

As you know, we’ve been looking for a dollar “correction” and lately have caught a bit of it, after being first steamrolled.  But as you also know, the dollar doesn’t have to “correct,” and its cranking again this morning.  Are we seeing a digestion of the sharp moves higher in the

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This morning, we our reprinting Currency Currents past from 28 August 2007; it’s the “best of Currency Currents” if you will.

What is interesting is that our top key news event back on 28 Aug ‘07 was Barclays, a UK bank that is in the news again today after sealing a deal to obtain funds from a couple of places that still have some—Abu Dhabi and Qatar. 

We particular liked this old issue because it lays out a thought process to help shield us from a world chock-full of guru-ism, which is always a danger to one’s trading account.  

As you know, we’ve been looking for a dollar “correction” and lately have caught a bit of it, after being first steamrolled.  But as you also know, the dollar doesn’t have to “correct,” and its cranking again this morning.  Are we seeing a digestion of the sharp moves higher in the

...

Dubai was also slated to introduce derivatives early next year, and will now launch derivatives and ETF at the same time.

 

The United Arab Emirates' Börse Dubai will delay its planned launch of exchange-traded funds until next year, in recognition of the poor market conditions.

The UAE is among a host of small, oil-rich nations seeking to turn themselves into global, and diversified, financial marketplaces. These nations and their exchanges have been partnering with U.S. and European exchange leaders at a rapid pace and cementing plans to move into all the listed-product areas, including ETFs, which the global exchange have pioneered. Abu Dhabi, Oman and Saudi Arabia are also looking at ETFs. Egypt plans to introduce ETFs next year, as well (see story here.)

The pullback from a planned earlier launch of ETFs by the Börse Dubai is no surprise given the general pullback by investors, and

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Concerned about the recent decline in stock prices, French President Nicolas Sarkozy, yesterday (Tuesday) called for the creation of European sovereign wealth funds. The funds would be virtual carbon copies of the state-owned investment vehicles that have sprung up from Beijing to Abu Dhabi to disperse their respective nations’ cash reserves in foreign assets.

Addressing the European Parliament, President Sarkozy implored his European contemporaries to embrace the current period of economic upheaval as an opportunity to restructure the global financial system. According to the Daily Telegraph, he also articulated the concern of many Western authorities that sovereign wealth funds, located primarily in Asia and the Middle East, could use their massive cash reserves to scoop up key foreign assets at extraordinarily low valuations.

“Stock markets are at historic lows. I do not want European citizens to wake up a few months from now and discover that European companies belong to

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The closest thing to an ETF market in the Middle East at this point is Turkey, where there are five ETFs from two asset managers

Abu Dhabi, the major Middle East financial center, says it's preparing to create a platform to launch exchange-traded funds.

In detailing plans on Thursday, Rashed Al Baloushi, the deputy chief executive of the Abu Dhabi Exchange (ADX), credits increasing ETF demand by retail and institutional investors in the Middle East for the exchange's decision to build an ETF-specific platform.

Across the Middle East, ETFs and other traded securities are proving more popular and catching the attention of exchanges. The Dubai International Financial Exchange (DIFX), as well as exchanges in Oman and Saudi Arabia, have also shown interest in adding ETFs.

The latest ETF plans are also part of ambitious efforts by many Middle East markets to diversify away from oil wealth and become true, global financial centers.

Earlier this year, the Abu Dhabi Securities Market

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Advanced Micro Devices (NYSE:AMD) will spin off its computer chip plants and receive a cash infusion of as much as $8.4 billion from an Abu Dhabi sovereign wealth fund. Will it help the chipmaker compete with its main rival, Intel (NYSE:INTC). Or will it leave it more vulnerable to a price war with Intel?

Just when it looked like AMD was going out-of-business, BAM! AMD’s (NYSE:AMD) shares were up 31% at one point today thanks to Abu Dhabi investing $5.7 billion which gets them a 55% stake in AMD and half the board seats.

Another Abu Dhabi government company, Mubadala Development Co., will spend $314 million to increase its stake in AMD to 19.3 percent from 8.1 percent and gain a seat on AMD’s board, AMD said in a statement.

Today …