Qatar's Sheikh Sultan bin Suhaim Al-Thani joins calls for meeting to end Gulf crisis

Dubai, Jan 12: Saudi Arabian oil giant Aramco announced Sunday that its initial public offering raised a record $29.4 billion, a figure higher than previously announced, after the company used a so-called "greenshoe option" to sell millions more shares to meet investor demand.

The company said that the sale of an additional 450 million shares took place during the initial public offering process.

The oil and gas company, which is majority owned by the state, began publicly trading on the local Saudi Tadawul exchange on December 11. It hit hit upwards of $10 a share on the second day of trading. This gave Aramco a market capitalization of $2 trillion, making it comfortably the world's most valuable company.

Aramco's additional sales mean the company has publicly floated 1.7% of its shares. It's IPO, even before the added sales, was the world's largest ever.

The shares sold in the over-allotment option "had been allocated to investors during the book-building process and therefore, no additional shares are being offered into the market today," Aramco said.

Company shares traded down on Sunday, dipping to around 34.7 riyals, or $9.25 a share, amid heightened tensions in the Persian Gulf between Iran and the United States. Aramco was a target of rising tensions over the summer when a missile and drone attack, which Saudi Arabia and the US blame on Iran, temporarily halved its production.

Sunday's trading figures value Aramco at $1.85 trillion, still well ahead of Apple, the second largest company in the world after Aramco, but below the $2 trillion mark sought by Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman.

With the launch of the Emirates Mars Mission less than a couple of weeks away, the spacecraft that will carry the UAE's Hope Probe to outer space has already been fuelled, it was announced today.

At a virtual briefing by the Mohammed bin Rashid Space Centre (MBRSC) today, the media was informed that scientists are busy giving finishing touches to the Hope Mars Mission, which will give mankind a complete picture of the Martian atmosphere once the UAE's indigenous probe reaches the Red Planet's orbit in 2021.

As the monitoring continues, final charging of the batteries is also ongoing, scientists said.

The space engineers averred that with this mission, the momentum in the region for space awareness will continue not only among young Emiratis but also among other youngsters in the Arab world.

The Hope Probe is scheduled to take off from Japan's Tanegashima Space Centre on July 15 at 00:51:27 UAE time.

The first Arab space mission to the Red Planet remained on track despite the challenges arising from the Covid-19 pandemic.

The spacecraft will provide the first global pictures of the Martian atmosphere and data will be shared freely with over 200 research centres across the world. It will help answer key questions about the global Martian atmosphere and the loss of hydrogen and oxygen gases into space over the span of one Martian year.

450 engineers, technicians and experts are involved in the project.  This comprises of 12,000 tasks in 6 years and entails 5.5 million working hours.

It includes 200 new technologies and 15 scientific partnerships with global universities and institutions.

The spaceship will travel 495 million km. It has a cruise speed of 121,000km/hour.

MBRSC is responsible for the execution and supervision of all stages of the design, development and launch of the Hope Probe. The UAE Space Agency is funding and supervising procedures and necessary details for the implementation of this project. After its launch in mid-July and following a journey of several months, the probe is expected to enter the Red Planet's orbit in 2021, coinciding with the Golden Jubilee of the Union.

Dubai, Jan 8: Iranian state television said on Wednesday that at least 80 "American terrorists" were killed in attacks involving 15 missiles Tehran launched on US targets in Iraq, adding that none of the missiles were intercepted.

State TV, citing a senior Revolutionary Guards source, also said Iran had 100 other targets in the region in its sights if Washington took any retaliatory measures. It also said US helicopters and military equipment were "severely damaged".

Iran launched missile attacks on US-led forces in Iraq in the early hours of Wednesday in retaliation for the US drone strike on an Iranian commander whose killing has raised fears of a wider war in the Middle East.