Fitch expects UAE GDP to rise in 2026 and maintains high-grade credit rating

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Fitch Ratings is expecting the UAE's economy to rise in 2026 as it maintained the country's high-grade credit rating, citing resilient fiscal buffers.Real gross domestic product…

Fitch Ratings is expecting the UAE's economy to rise in 2026 as it maintained the country's high-grade credit rating, citing resilient fiscal buffers.

Real gross domestic product in the Arab world's second largest economy would grow by 0.5 per cent this year, despite an estimated 1.5 per cent contraction in non-oil GDP, the New York-based agency said on Friday.

Analysts at Fitch said Dubai's real GDP would remain below its 2025 level next year, as it continues to recover from the effect of the Iran war. The emirate's economy hit Dh473 billion ($128.8 billion) in the first half of 2026, down 2.3 per cent from a year earlier, as growth in financial services, healthcare and construction helped offset weakness in other sectors, government data showed last month.

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Hydrocarbon GDP is expected to rise by about 7 per cent in 2026, then spike by 26 per cent next year, with oil production no longer constrained by Opec+ quotas, Fitch said. The Emirates formally withdrew from the oil group in May.

"Fitch expects all the emirates will put recovery programmes in place, but non-oil trend growth will be below pre-war levels over our forecast period," the Fitch analysts wrote.

Fitch also kept the UAE's sovereign credit rating at AA-, with a stable outlook, reflecting low consolidated government debt, strong net external asset position and high GDP per capita.

An AA- rating is the fourth-highest on Fitch's rating scale, just three notches below the top prime grade. Investment grade makes it easier to access capital markets and raise funding when the need to borrow arises.

Fitch said the Emirates also benefits from Abu Dhabi's sovereign net foreign assets which, at 180 per cent of UAE GDP in 2026, are among the highest of Fitch-rated sovereigns, it said. Fitch had rated Abu Dhabi AA in May.

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