Sunday, July 24, 2016

Qatar Stock Exchange and Iridium Launch Second Investor Relations Excellence Program

Doha, Qatar - Sunday, July 24th 2016 [ME NewsWire]

(BUSINESS WIRE)-- Qatar Stock Exchange and Iridium Investor Relation today jointly announced that the Investor Relations Excellence Program will be repeated for a second year after its successful launch in 2015. The IR Excellence Program, which is the first of its kind in the Arabian Gulf region, will once again recognize publicly listed companies for their achievements and proactive efforts to foster professional investor relations standards.

Mr. Rashid Bin Ali Al-Mansoori, Chief Executive Officer of Qatar Stock Exchange said: “The IR Excellence Program celebrates companies that do best in investor relations, while helping all other listed companies to think about how they can strengthen their investor relations. As investor relations builds confidence, drives trading activity and enhances market accessibility, the program supports our agenda as a stock exchange to build a competitive market place that reinforces Qatar’s position within the global emerging markets universe.”

The QSE IR Excellence Program last year crowned QNB as Qatar's best company overall for excellence in Investor Relations. There was also formal recognition for small-, mid- and large cap companies, the best Chief Financial Officer and best Investor Relations Officer as well as the top three corporate investor relations websites in the country.

On his part, Mr. Oliver Schutzmann, CEO of Iridium, said: "The IR Excellence program has been designed to foster the development of international investor relations standards in Qatar over time. It serves as a starting point for companies that are looking for ways to build an investor relations capability and a benchmark for company leaders who are looking to enhance the way they engage, transact and communicate with the investment community.”

In July 2016, QSE and Iridium expect to communicate the revised IR Excellence Program methodology to all market participants, after which listed companies will have three months to review and implement upgrades to their investor relations efforts.

The IR Excellence Program has been benchmarked globally against best practices to ensure a transparent methodology. The methodology and all ranking criteria are made public. This enables companies to review categories and selection criteria, and gives them advance notice to adjust their Investor Relations efforts, especially with regards to their investor relations websites.

Mr. Abdul Aziz Al Emadi, Director of Listing Department in QSE, said: “I was impressed by the overall standard of investor relations of Qatari companies. Whilst the IR Excellence Program is a new QSE initiative and is still in its second year, we have been encouraging our listed companies over a number of years to adopt best practice including the establishment of specific expertise in dedicated Departments and we see the Investor Relations Excellence Program as another part of that on-going development.”

Contacts

Qatar Stock Exchange

Jamal Yasin Al-Rihawi

Tel: +974 4433 3666

Email: jamal@qe.qa



or

Iridium Advisors

Oliver Schutzmann

Tel.:+971 4 574 5757

ir@iridium.ae







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