joining us now with more on these record sales is lyubov pronina, who covers the emerging markets forid it need to sell double as much as investors were expecting? lyubov: basically, it needs to finance and raise more money. countries from the region are running deficits, because of the slump in major commodities and oil. this is a way to raise money, and a lot of money. it is an unprecedented deal. recently we had abu dhabi come into the market with $5 billion in on sales. and qatar in the past was a big issue. this is really unprecedented. next, we could have saudi arabia and the region itself is showing a record first half. mark: just the fact that it has plonked so much debt out there, it ensures that there won't be other offerings in the near future, other big offerings from the countries you were mentioning? lyubov: there are expectations that saudi arabia will come to the market with the first international bond sale, and people are expecting a big volume as well. the country has said it will be a significant amount, but we don't know exactly how big it will be. some people are