(Bloomberg) -- Twitter is the flavor of the week in the United Arab Emirates, with the rulers of traditional Abu Dhabi and tourist hot-spot Dubai taking to the network to reveal deals worth billions of dollars.
Abu Dhabi’s Crown Prince Mohammed Bin Zayed Al Nahyan tweeted Wednesday a decision to combine two wealth funds, creating one with assets of about $250 billion. The short tweet that “applauded” the restructuring with little other details, came 15 minutes before the state-run news agency published the news.
Dubai’s ruler on Tuesday used Twitter to announce a $8.2 billion venture between property developers in the two emirates. Earlier this week, Abu Dhabi’s oil giant tweeted that it’s awarding contracts to Total SA, before the French company sent a statement.
Middle East leaders are keeping up with a global trend that has shifted importance from traditional media outlets to social media. World leaders from U.K. Prime Minister Theresa May and U.S. President Donald Trump to European Council’s President Donald Tusk regularly use Twitter.
Oil-rich Saudi Arabia has also taken to social media to put out some statements, which in the past have been almost exclusively announced through the Saudi Press Agency or via state TV.
©2018 Bloomberg L.P.
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