Holland’s future Queen spent Friday in the town of Hoorn located in the north of the country. There Crown Princess Maxima chatted about microfinance with a financing company and local entrepreneurs. That field is her speciality, as she’s a former banker with a degree in economics.
The Crown Princess met with Start Guide, the company that helps entrepreneurs get started by use of microfinance. She was accompanied by Frank Heemskerk, State Secretary of Economic Affairs. Maxima then met for over an hour with small business owners who had benefited from microfinance.
Microfinance in the Netherlands is for people with good business plans, but who need help in developing their plans or what a bank can not correct. With coaching and credit they get the chance to make good plans approved. Start Guide focuses on people who are threatened with unemployment, labor market starters and existing entrepreneurs who could use extra support.
It should be noted that Princess Maxima is a member of Holland’s Council of Microfinance.
On Monday, Dutch Crown Princess Maxima attended the microfinancing event, “Who Profits?” at the Peace Palace at The Hague. The meeting, organized by Radio Netherlands Worldwide, focused on how to help Third World nations receive proper finances, and Maxima asked for developed nations to allow poorer countries to get easier funding.
“What I would like to make clear here is that we are inclined to focus on loans, while other financial products like savings are possibly more important for poor people,” the former banker said in her opening speech.
Check out the video below about the “Who Profits?” event, which includes an excerpt of the Crown Princess’ speech (in English)
This week, Hereditary Grand Duke Guillaume of Luxembourg will be in the Persian Gulf region to promote his country’s financial sector. He will be in Bahrain, Dubai, Abu Dhabi and Qatar, and is travelling with a delegation of representatives, including Finance Minister Luc Frieden.
Ministère des Finances de Luxembourg
In each country Guillaume stopped by, he met with political and business leaders. For example, in Bahrain Monday, the Prince and Frieden met with Prime Minister Sheikh Khalifa bin Salman Al Khalifa.
Furthermore, Guillaume and Frieden will speak at seminars developed by the Luxembourg for Finance, a developmental agency.
Earlier this week, Dubai ruler Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid al-Maktoum said the media exaggerated his emirate’s debt crisis, and that the world is being misled over how Dubai would solve the problem. The Sheikh also verbally attacked international investors by saying, “they do not understand anything.”
www.sheikhmohammed.ae
Speaking in an e-mailed statement, the Sheikh, who is also prime minister and vice-president of the United Arab Emirates, said “The media hype is exaggerated and will not hurt our perseverance. Dubai World is independent from the [UAE]government.”
“We are strong and persistent,” he added. “It is the fruit-bearing tree that becomes the target of [stone] throwers.”
Dubai World, the state-run company behind the sheikhdom’s property boom, began talks with banks yesterday on how to fix the $26 billion debt. It is also seeking to delay pay backs on less than half of its $59 billion of obligations, easing the possible damage to banks recovering from the credit crisis.
Analysts are saying there is now deep distrust towards Dubai, and a lot of work needs to be done to repair that.
Meanwhile, despite the emirate’s financial problems, Sheikh Mohammed still found the time to purchase some racing horses. Two days before Dubai sent shockwaves across global stockmarkets, he bought eight horses for almost $2 million.
“The horse side of the business is the private enjoyment of Sheikh Mohammed, so therefore has nothing whatever to do with the government, or government funds and the restructuring,” said John Ferguson, the Sheikh’s horse buying adviser.
As Dubai’s debt worsens, its ruler, Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid al-Maktoum may have to turn to its oil-rich fellow emirate, Abu Dhabi for help.
MARWAN NAAMANI/AFP/Getty Images/FILE
But will that emirate assist Dubai again? Abu Dhabi already helped Dubai earlier this year with a $10 billion bailout when the global recession first hit. Sheikh Mohammed has always said the two emirates have tight bonds, but how the two will ride out this financial crisis will determine that.
“Differences between the two city-states remain on how to approach the economy and the financial crisis,” said Hani Sabra of Eurasia Group, a U.S.-based research firm. “But now Abu Dhabi is obviously the more dominant emirate.”
When Dubai announced its debt payment was being put on hold, two Abu-Dhabi banks bought $5 billion Dubai bonds, but nothing more.
“I guess Abu Dhabi is saying there will be no blank check for Dubai,” said Jane Kinninmont, a London-based specialist on Gulf economies at the Economist Intelligence Unit.
Just this month, Sheikh Mohammed insisted that all was well with Dubai’s finances and told media critics to “shut up.” Most of the plans he had for Dubai’s development – such as real-estate on the artificial island Palm Jumeirah, and other major property plans – have been put on hold. As a result, Dubai has become the biggest symbol of the global property bubble bursting. Its financial woes have some wondering if another crisis is on the way.
Next week may display that. The global stock markets reopen on Monday, following the shockwaves Dubai caused on Friday. Wednesdaay is the UAE’s national day. Whether Abu Dhabi is willing to help its neighbor remains to be seen.
“There is no point throwing good money into Dubai’s black holes,” said Christopher Davidson, an expert in Emirate affairs at Britain’s Durham University. “These are mistakes of Sheikh Mohammed and he needs to deal with them.”
Two weeks after her appointment as the UN Advocate for Inclusive Finances for Development, Crown Princess Maxima spoke at a special event ahead of the International Monetary Fund and World Bank Meeting in Istanbul Monday.
The IMF managing director Dominique Strauss-Kahn and Maxima launched a Dutch-funded project in Istanbul, which is a global project aimed at collecting data on access to financial services in a bid to help policies aimed at reducing poverty.
In her speech, the Crown Princess explained how the project intends to help the 2 billion people worldwide who do not have access to finances.
“It is clear that national strategies and visions need to be developed,” Maxima said. “These strategies need the engagement of governments, the country’s regulators and supervisors, financial institutions (including NGO’s) and even telecom providers or retailers. All of these should work together to increase access to financial services.”
“The innovations in the field of financial inclusion are enormous,” she continued. “Technologies like smart cards, ATMs, and mobile banking hold the promise of both greatly expanding financial access and slashing costs for providers – making it possible to reach communities once thought infeasible.
“Also, new savings and insurance products are being piloted around the world, and having appropriate regulations is essential in taking them to scale.”
Maxima went on to talk about how the project helps to identify knowledge gaps and priorities for policy, monitors the effectiveness of policies over time, and finally provide a platform for researchers to better understand the causes and implications of financial access.
“While the IMF’s commitment is truly a breakthrough, it is also just a beginning,” the Crown Princess said. “Going forward, additional support is necessary. We need a continued push in the form of high-level commitment from governments and donors to complement this important effort with bottom-up data that will help unlock valuable information about financial services at the individual and household level.”
At the end of her speech, Maxima thanked the audience for their attention, but most importantly thanked the IMF for coming up with the initiative.
Crown Princess Maxima added another title to her long list yesterday. United Nations Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon named her the U.N. Special Advocate for Inclusive Finance for Development. She will be Ban’s representative on making financial development available to third world countries.
Reuters
In those countries, many are unable to take out a loan or even open a bank account. The U.N. is focused on changing that.
A former banker, Maxima has been a member of a U.N. board for microfinance and an accessible financial sector for a few years now, and this position displays how she is well trusted with these kinds of issues.
The Crown Princess is the second member of the Dutch royal family to be given a high position in the United Nations. Her husband, Crown Prince Willem-Alexander has been Chairman of the water and sanitation committee since 2006.
Maxima is also going to be present at the Clinton Global Initiative, and will be making a speech there later on today.
Liechtenstein’s sovereign Prince Hans Adam II has outraged German Jews yet again. He did so by saying the Holocaust is the reason for his tiny country’s banking secrecy during an interview with a Liechtenstein newspaper.
liechtenstein.li
“We and Switzerland saved many people, especially Jews, with banking secrecy,” The Prince said to the Liechtensteiner Volksblatt. “Germany should clean up its own act, and think about its past.” The latter was in reference to Germany criticizing the principality for tax evasion.
Hans Adam went on to explain that Jewish people were able to store their finances in this micro-state’s banks during the Nazi period.
“The comments are a mockery of the Holocaust and its survivors,” Stephan Kramer, general secretary of the German Central Council of Jews, told Bild newspaper. “It is historically incorrect for him to portray Liechtenstein as a merciful helper of the Jews. It is an attempt to use the Holocaust as a defense for the prince’s political failures. His highness would be better off retiring.”
The last time Hans Adam outraged German Jews was back in 2008, when he called Germany the “Fourth Reich.”
Prince Hans-Adam is Liechtenstein’s head of state, but in 2004, he gave his powers to his son, Prince Alois.
NOTE: the following is an article written by the AFP’s Andre Lehmann
Liechstenstein will remain a major financial centre even after the easing of its banking secrecy rules, thanks to its know-how in wealth management, its ruling prince says.
AFP
“For years we have acquired in-depth knowledge in the area of wealth management,” Prince Alois von und zu Liechstenstein told AFP in an interview in his castle overlooking the capital Vaduz.
In March, the principality agreed to conform to standards set by the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development regarding fiscal transparency.
That effectively ended decades of banking secrecy upon which Liechstenstein – sandwiched between Austria and Switzerland, with a population of 35,000 – built its financial service industry.
Still on the OECD grey list of tax havens, Liechstenstein has signed a number of bilateral agreements – most recently with Britain – on exchanging tax information.
Wealth under management in Liechstenstein fell 19 per cent last year to €148.4 billion due to the global financial crisis and the fallout over the theft of data from the LGT banking group.
But Prince Alois, 41, was optimistic.
“Liechstenstein is going to remain an attractive place,” given its status as “a paradise of stability from a political and economic point of view,” he said.
He also pointed to foundations, trusts, pension and investment funds, and the insurance sector, which have given a second wind to the principality.
The principality – a member of the European Economic Area since 1995 – is part of the European single market without being inside the European Union.
“It is hard to predict which sector is going to grow in the future,” Prince Alois said, “but I would not be surprised if the financial services sector is going to experience a boom.”
Liechstenstein, where the financial sector accounts for 29 per cent of gross domestic product, nevertheless is playing catch-up.
Historically discreet, it found itself under scrutiny in Europe last year after a former LGT employee sold a compact disc with data about bank clients to the German secret service.
Scandal in Germany ensued, leading to the resignation of the chief executive of Deutsche Post, Klaus Zumwinkel amid suspicions of tax fraud.
Liechstenstein remained in the line of fire, notably from Germany, over banking secrecy, until it revised its policy in March.
“We had already prepared before March 12 a reorientation of the financial market,” the prince said, adding that “it was foreseeable that there would be changes everywhere”.
“Of course, we were irritated by the attitude” of the German authorities, and relations with Berlin were “tense,” he said, but the signing in July of an agreement with Germany on exchanging tax information “has straightened the situation”.
Crown Princess Maxima was in Utrecht Thursday for the general meeting of Rabobank on “Importance and Challenges of Development Banking.” The bank, which focuses on agriculture, serves developing nations in Latin America, Asia and Africa.
Maxima spoke about Rabobank’s successes at the meeting.
“I would like to congratulate and encourage Rabobank in the role that you play to make this happen in many countries in Africa, Asia and Latin America. You will make it possible to experience sustainability and rural development should be shared between many people in different situations. That creates alongside economic growth and reduce hunger and poverty also a relationship between people.”
The Crown Princess compared the needs of the third world to the way the Netherlands was over a hundred years ago.
“The Netherlands, and the whole agricultural sector, was in extreme poverty between 1882…. [t]his agricultural depression came at a time when social unrest was already high. Since then, public and private investment in agriculture to ensure a higher food production in the Netherlands and prosperity in rural areas.
“Today, the situation in many poor countries like the Netherlands when: poverty, lack of investment and lack of technological opportunities to increase production. Since the fifties, the grain on the world market steadily declined. This world has contributed to a structural reduction of investment in the agricultural sector. In many parts of the world, the situation in rural areas has not improved: 70% of the poorest live in rural areas and many of them can not or barely in their own food needs.”
Maxima reminded the audience of 1200 attendants of how they are connected to those in poorer nations.
“The quality and availability of almost all products you purchase will depend on farmers in distant countries. Your cup of coffee, sugar cube, the chocolates, tropical fruit salad or your clothes of cotton: It connects us with people all over the world.”
Lastly, the Princess spoke of how Rabobank brings together the world.
“[W]hat binds them is the desire for progress, to escape from a vicious circle of poverty and lack of opportunities. Your commitment over so many decades, shows us that, as in 1896, the rural development in the world a matter of shared self is.”
A former banker, Crown Princess Maxima works on behalf of the United Nations with microfinancing issues in the developing world.
