Nimrod Raphaeli and Bianca Gersten: Sovereign Wealth Funds: Investment Vehicles for the Persian Gulf Countries - 'Countries have used sovereign wealth funds (SWFs) as instruments through which to buy assets with their surplus foreign exchange since the 1950s when Norway and Singapore, and soon after Kuwait, sought new strategies to insulate themselves from exchange rate fluctuation. Central banks employed SWFs only as buffers for currency stabilization when countries had little or no international debt and large current account surpluses. Today, SWFs have become quite common. As of March 2007, the United Arab Emirates (UAE) and Saudi Arabia had, respectively, the first and third largest SWFs internationally, and Kuwait ranked sixth. Because of burgeoning oil prices, Persian Gulf sovereign wealth funds have become the preferred investment vehicles of Kuwait, Qatar, and the United Arab Emirates. As SWFs blur the line between public and private investment, however, Western nations worry about the security implications of foreign countries, including Persian Gulf states, acquiring important positions in key industries and companies...'