The Saudis no longer give out free money
The renowned Saudi investment fund, valued at over 900 billion dollars, and the legendary enthusiasm of its managers for granting credit, loans, and investments to companies and well-known investment funds, was once the first choice for investors to quickly secure capital with minimal interest.
This trend perhaps continued until a few months ago. One of the last relatively quickly accessible large investments was received by the well-known investment company BlackRock, and even the 5 billion dollars that the Saudis provided them came with stricter conditions than before.
Gone are the days of ‘take it from my pocket’ for large Western companies. The conditions and behavior of the renowned Saudi investment fund have changed.
Committees to review capital requests have been formed and are operational, and companies and funds have been adapting to this process for several months.
As a result, capital requests have decreased, and many of them come with specific conditions.
Companies that want to operate in Saudi Arabia must establish their Middle Eastern headquarters in Riyadh and forget about going to Dubai, especially as Dubai and Abu Dhabi have been more aggressively attracting investors to their territories in the past couple of years. The Saudis have also taken their foreign investment attraction program seriously.
Since 2017, when the famous Vision 2030 plan began, Saudi Arabia has attracted an average of 12 billion dollars in foreign investment annually, and in its latest revision, the plan aims to reach 100 billion dollars annually by 2030.
Experts deem this dream impossible to achieve, but that doesn’t mean the Saudis will stop trying.
New laws have been drafted to facilitate and encourage foreign investment with the aim of competing with the UAE and Qatar, and the Saudis are determined to increase their country’s economic, cultural, and social appeal to match that of the golden land, Dubai.
