Golf courses, skyscrapers, cryptocurrency: Trump family's Middle East business flourishes
Ahead of US President Donald Trump's Gulf visit next week, his son Eric was promoting his cryptocurrency firm in Dubai, while Don Jnr prepared to talk about 'Monetising Maga' in Doha.
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Last month, the Trump Organization struck its first luxury real estate deal in Qatar, and released details of a billion-dollar skyscraper in Dubai whose flats can be bought in cryptocurrency.
In a monarchical region awash with petrodollars, the list of Trump-related ventures is long and growing. However, the presidential entourage is not the only party cashing in, analysts said.
'Gulf governments likely see the presence of the Trump brand in their countries as a way to generate goodwill with the new administration,' said Robert Mogielnicki of the Arab Gulf States Institute in Washington.
If the president chose, he could hopscotch the region from one Trump venture to another when he visits Saudi Arabia, Qatar and the United Arab Emirates next week on the first foreign tour of his second term.
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From Dubai's Trump International golf course, to a high-rise residential block in Jeddah and a US$4 billion golf and real estate project on Omani state-owned land, business links are not hard to find in the desert autocracies.
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