Zubair Naeem Paracha

Public company data in the Middle East is surprisingly hard to work with. For a lot of my writing on Termsheet, I do it regularly, and the process is painful. Data scattered across exchange websites (and some other portals), PDFs that won’t open, financials in different formats. You sometimes end up with 10 browser tabs open just to understand basic stuff about one company. To solve this, I am building this little thing called @Premargin with @ritwickdsouza. It lists all the public companies across Saudi Arabia, UAE, Qatar, Kuwait, with their financials (a bit light at the moment but more coming soon), disclosures, and fundamentals. There’s also a screener that allows you to filter companies by stock performance, valuation, ratios, and a few other things. Nothing fancy at the moment. Just the data you need, organized like it should have been from the start. Still early, still building. But it works. I am using it myself. Play with it here premargin.com. And please do share your feedback.

@pitdesi Can you share an example of a general query where it was as good as/better than Claude/ChatGPT. Just curious.

I added Meta ai to my Home Screen, finding it great for general queries. Surprised more people aren’t talking about it

"Thank you for your attention to this matter." Wow the audacity.

@AZK_SA @neoteksa Don't think they're the first. wamda.com/2026/03/saudi-…

البنك المركزي السعودي يمنح @neoteksa أول ترخيص للمصرفية المفتوحة في المملكة 🇸🇦🚀 نيوتك شركة FinTech متخصصة في المصرفية المفتوحة والبيانات، توفّر بنية تحتية رقمية تمكّن الجهات من تطوير منتجات وخدمات مبتكرة neotek.sa

The Keeta impact: Jahez saw a clear step down in 2025. Growth slowed to single digits for the first time. Saudi net revenue ↓ 8.6%. All growth came from outside the core market. Net margin 3.1% - lowest ever. Pressure on both growth and profitability.

The stock is down ~60% over the past year. Market cap now ~$640M.

PCB bans Naseem’s social media manager from working with contracted players. In the same breath, they fine Naseem the biggest fine in PCB history. If your own punishment confirms the manager did it, how do you justify fining the player? Make it make sense 🤔

Crazy.

@sarahakram1 G9: maps.app.goo.gl/azSNTuEuC3eETN…

@xParacha Where is this located?

I've never had this good an experience at any government office in Pakistan. The recently established Asaan Khidmat Markaz in Islamabad is probably the only example of what thoughtful public service delivery can look like in this country. Well-trained staff. Modern spaces. No chaos. You walk out feeling like your taxes are being put into good use. Everyone involved deserves to know they've set a bar. This is what Pakistani embassies around the world should feel like. Instead, most treat citizens with complete disregard for dignity, and every officer acts like they're doing you a favor. A tall ask given how these places are run. But still; a man can wish.

@FarooqTirmizi That's great. Most in the Middle East, however, don't treat people well.

@xParacha The Embassy of Pakistan in Washington and the Consulate in New York are rather good. I’ve never had a bad experience there and I’ve had to go there frequently for all sorts of documents.

Saw 10–12 government and Military Police cars on M2 (Islamabad–Lahore) yesterday. None at 100 km/h; all above 120, some pushing 130. Like everything else, the burden falls on average citizens, while those in power continue to ignore the rules, knowing there are no consequences.

A quick look at how @Premargin actually works today. The workflow is pretty simple. 1. Start with a company overview and key metrics 2. Go into financials and look at the business over time 3. Check valuation and ratios 4. Scan disclosures (now with AI summaries) 5. Use the screener to find and compare companies More coming soon, but would love feedback on what’s already there; especially from anyone tracking GCC equities. Trying to understand what would make this genuinely useful for following public markets in the region.

Disclosures on @premargin now include AI summaries.

Introducing: OpenGranola 🔥 I built an open source meeting copilot for macOS. It transcribes both sides of your call on-device, searches your own notes in real time, and hands you talking points right when the conversation needs them. No audio leaves your Mac. Point it at a folder of markdown files, pick any LLM through OpenRouter (Claude, GPT-4o, Gemini, Llama), and it just works. It's invisible to screen share too — nobody knows you have it. The whole thing is open source. Link below

2025 was one of the strongest years for ecommerce growth in Saudi. Ecommerce volume on Mada cards reached $86.4 billion, growing almost 65 percent year-over-year. (Mada is not the full ecommerce market, but it is a useful proxy for tracking the direction and pace of growth). What stands out is not just the growth rate, but the base. Growth was higher in 2021 and 2022, but those years came off a much smaller level of ecommerce volume. That makes 2025 especially notable. Ecommerce grew quickly even at a far larger scale. (I have tried but haven't been able to figure out what caused this acceleration). What this means though is a much bigger revenue pool for the entire stack: merchants, marketplaces, payment firms, BNPL companies, ecommerce infrastructure providers, and many other players. More in upcoming issue of Termsheet. Subscribe now. Link in bio.

@bpangti For Saudi, Tamara now offers longer payment cycles than Tabby. In the UAE, Tabby offers subscriptions and a card. And both of them, AFAIK, occasionally have exclusive deals with merchants for discounts. In terms of product though, can't really say.

@xParacha How do Tabby and Tamara differentiate from each other? Too close an offering and too close a gap?

@AkankshaGoel Thank you, Akanksha.

@xParacha Love this. Can’t wait to take the platform for a little test drive. Nice wedge.

Public company data in the Middle East is surprisingly hard to work with. For a lot of my writing on Termsheet, I do it regularly, and the process is painful. Data scattered across exchange websites (and some other portals), PDFs that won’t open, financials in different formats. You sometimes end up with 10 browser tabs open just to understand basic stuff about one company. To solve this, I am building this little thing called @Premargin with @ritwickdsouza. It lists all the public companies across Saudi Arabia, UAE, Qatar, Kuwait, with their financials (a bit light at the moment but more coming soon), disclosures, and fundamentals. There’s also a screener that allows you to filter companies by stock performance, valuation, ratios, and a few other things. Nothing fancy at the moment. Just the data you need, organized like it should have been from the start. Still early, still building. But it works. I am using it myself. Play with it here premargin.com. And please do share your feedback.