DUBAI: Mohammed Al-Jadaan, Saudi Arabia’s minister of finance, has said that it would be a very difficult six months ahead for the global economy, even as his outlook for the Gulf region was split.
“It is very difficult to predict what is coming to the world, but worldwide it is going to be a very difficult six months. Regional, I think the region is largely split into two areas, one is the Gulf region I think the next 6 months or the next 6 years are going to be actually very good. The wider region is going to be very difficult and it is our role to help that wider region,” Al-Jadaan said during a plenary at day two of the Future Investment Initiative (FII).
“You cannot look at the world in one way… we have seen how the world is almost split into [the] optimistic side that are looking for the future, those who have planned, that who are able to make long-term decisions and prepare themselves for difficult times are reaping the benefits. Those who haven’t are facing difficult times… and the world is going through a very, very difficult time,” the Saudi official explained.
“I think what we need to do is encourage cooperation and collaboration. The world needs stability, predictability for macrofinance to be available, for investment to be available. And that is becoming very difficult with all the shocks we have seen.”
The three-day Riyadh event gathered more than 6,000 participants – from policymakers, investors, entrepreneurs to young leaders – for discussions on topics ranging from geoeconomics to gaming.
During Tuesday’s sessions, delegates explored issues such as supply-chain disruption, the growing demand for travel since the lifting of pandemic restrictions, e-commerce, cybercrime, and the widespread problem of rising inflation.
Saudi Minister of Investment Khalid Al-Falih in a plenary session said that the energy crisis in Europe will accelerate the oil and gas sector’s transition to renewables and hydrogen.
Saudi Arabia’s Energy Minister Prince Abdulaziz bin Salman, in a separate session, meanwhile said that some were using their emergency stocks and using it as a mechanism to manipulate markets when its purpose should be to mitigate any shortages of supply.
Princess Reema bint Bandar, the Kingdom’s ambassador to Washington, also explained that the current discord between Saudi Arabia and the US was “not political” but “purely economic.”
Meanwhile, on the sidelines of the Riyadh event, Saudi Arabia’s Ministry of Investment signed five investment agreements in the aerospace (Boeing and Orbitel), technology (Ginkgo Bioworks and Taihan Cable & Solution) and finance (BTG Pactual) sectors to further cement its emerging positioning in global value chains.
Other plenary sessions for the day include the rise of geoeconomics, the energy transition calibrating the new energy economy, financing net zero and building a better crypto economy.
As it happens: The following are live updates on the highlights of the second day at FII 6th edition. (All timings are GMT)
Saudi Aramco CEO Amin Nasser announced that the company will launch a $1.5 billion sustainability fund to invest in stable and inclusive energy transition technology.
Saudi Arabia’s Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman announced that the Kingdom’s Public Investment Fund will establish five more regional investment companies, in Jordan, Bahrain, Sudan, Iraq, and Oman.
Noel Quinn, Group CEO of HSBC Holdings: “Our ambition for Net Zero is to employ our balance sheet capability, and our capital markets fund raising capability for the benefit of our clients to make sure to make it available to them the finance they need for their transition journey.”
Fahad Al-Saif, head of global capital finance of Public Investment Fund: “For the past 200 years, the revolution of energy has been the core of industrial revolution. In the coming 30 years, we are supposed to re-engineer that core, whether sectoral based or financial based.”
“Trillions of dollars are required between now and 2050-2060 which is an aggregation of about $100 trillion for the asset managers to seek as capital to deploy for all of us to transition. The issue is today, since the sustainability markets opened, we have only $1 trillion.”
“Within PIF, our commitment to sustainability programs within 13 sectors, we have taken initial steps and these have included setting up the benchmark on how we are able to emphasize that market, not being as an issuer or proceeds taker but more importantly becoming more inclusive in terms of the stakeholders that are relevant to this market. The issue we might be facing is are we all aligned to take the same phase, and not to be affected by the multiple phases, and risking exclusions.”
0921: Plenary on Financing Net Zero with Fahad Al-Saif, head of global capital finance of Public Investment Fund and Noel Quinn, Group CEO of HSBC Holdings.
Mohammed Abunayyan, chairman of ACWA Power: “The government, they are good at being regulators and not operators. I think public-private partnership is the best, the private sector will be able to innovate in finance and finance structuring. I believe it is a matter of how you do it all together.”
“I think we are very lucky in this country… we have a clear, robust strategy on energy. We have a clarity on how to do things in a timely manner and phasing it in a proper time and proper action. The reality today is renewable and the energy transition today for Saudi Arabia, for the youth it would be better in the environmental [aspect] and for other reasons, but it is the best quality of jobs and creating more jobs and having more capacities and more capability increase our ability for our industrialization.”
Dr. Nabeel Al-Amudi, CEO of Olayan Financing Company: “Given the fragility of the world order we are seeing, and therefore the fragility of the energy systems, I don’t want to say it is inevitable… because things might change but there is a need to be regionally more focused, for national champions to become regional champions or even global champions. That is what you need, for regions to look around in terms of the resilience of the energy systems.”
“I am a believer in technology, human ingenuity will hopefully come through… there are many engineers working on things that are much more interesting than talking here at FII.”
Mohammed Abunayyan, chairman of ACWA Power: “I do not want to appear negative, but I think we are seeing these countries and these governments that go through elections, they overpromise and less deliver. It is a good thing that there are countries that do not need to overpromise, these countries would do much, much better. They would make it better, and I could say the best example is Saudi Arabia.”
“Saudi Arabia, the biggest conventional energy [player] in the world… has decided to go 50% renewable and they have put what all it takes to make it happen. It is not about announcing, it is about making it happen.”
“I like what China is doing, I’m pro-China. I’m sorry, people maybe may not like it but I’m pro- China. Because ACWA Power has been very committed with China a long time ago and one of our success factors come from China. I like the way they do it, they just said things and make it happen.”
“People are always talking about energy… and that is very irrelevant to the whole world, but they did not talk about how to make it happen cross-borders. Europe for a very long time they are together but they not together in the energy, every country has its own agenda and every country they are concerned [about] political, social [issues] not to get through another energy source. For Europe to be able to be there, they have to go through what our leaders, and Crown Prince has announced, a country like Saudi Arabia will be a production [source] to the whole world, specially to Europe where we have competitive edge and we could really put a lot of energy to Europe.”
Dr. Nabeel Al-Amudi, CEO of Olayan Financing Company: “The recent crisis shows the fragility of the world order and therefore the fragility of energy system. What we need to build into the discussion is resiliency. How do we make sure that we have a resilient energy system globally, regionally, by country, that is important. What is the role then of the private sector versus the government. Without a clear government direction… the private sector cannot react in terms of investments.”
Mohammed Abunayyan, chairman of ACWA Power: “We are lucky today because the technology is really evolving. What we thought before, it is not economical and cannot be done technically as a baseload is becoming a baseload and renewable. I think the energy transition, what has happened today really has been pushed forward and will really come to stream.”
“In ACWA Power, we have been and still we are, are the disruptive of this sector. I still remember when people were saying that solar was not going to be economical and it is not affordable. Well we brought it to the level today that it is the cheapest production in the whole world.”
“The same thing with wind, the same thing with green hydrogen we have done the same thing, it is happening. As a base load of power plant producing 24 hours it [has] become available and dispatchable. And that is a reality in Dubai, where Noor Energy will be the biggest in earth, renewable plant producing 24 hours as a baseload and it is cheaper than gas before the prices increased.”
“I think the advantage the of renewable versus conventional is the storage of power.”
Gerard Mestrallet, executive chairman of French Agency for Alula Development: “If want to be carbon-neutral in 2050 we need to massive invest in renewables, we are not going quickly enough. We must also invest in hydrogen, because hydrogen would bring the necessary solution for storage.”
“If want to completely transform the energy sector, from the old system to the new system… it will take 20 years. If we try to destroy too early the oil and gas system… we will have an enormous problem of security of supply, that is what we are facing today.”
0840: Plenary on Calibrating The New Energy Economy with Mohammed Abunayyan, chairman of ACWA Power; Dr. Nabeel Al-Amudi, CEO of Olayan Financing Company; Henrik Andersen, president and CEO of Vestas Wind Systems and Gerard Mestrallet, executive chairman of French Agency for Alula Development.
Lord Turner, chairman of the Energy Transitions Commission: “I think it is clear in order to be serious about climate change we have not only peak emissions in this decade, we have to achieve a significant reduction... clearly there had been some bad things for that process towards energy transition, for instance Europe is now burning more coal because it is short of gas ahead of this winter. Overall, what is happening in the world today makes me more confident that we would get significant emission reductions during the 2020s.”
“There is revolution going on in solar. Secondly, the impact of the Ukraine war had been clearly to accelerate plans to head towards renewables, to head toward efficiency, to deals with some of things like planning and permitting barriers that get in the way.”
0821: Plenary on The Energy Transition with Lord Turner, chairman of the Energy Transitions Commission and Stephen Moss, regional chief executive officer for the Middle East, North Africa and Turkey of HSBC Bank Middle East Limited.
Sebastian Kurz, former federal chancellor of Austria: “I don’t think that you can divide government from people or government from the private sector. But of course regarding to the sanctions, if a country invades another country on our continent there was a necessity for EU to react, and the EU did it with sanctions. So I think it was an absolutely understandable decision. What is important whenever you implement sanction that means you should do it in a way that you opponent hit harder than you are hit yourself.”
“I think Russia is definitely hit hard, and I think that everybody who says the Russian economy is not suffering is wrong especially after kicking them out from SWIFT hurt them a lot. On the other hand, the high energy cost they are a major problem for the EU for the moment, nobody in Europe wanted this war. The EU did not want this war.”
Shu Nyatta, founder of Bicycle Capital: “I invest in Latin America, and it is a very schizophrenic business because either we are the friend of the government or the foe of the government depending on what the companies do… you can end up on one side or the other of the geoeconomic debate.”
Stephen Harper, former prime minister of Canada: “We essentially severed our economic relationship with Russia after the invasion of Crimea in 2014. It was our judgment… it was the judgment of our government that Vladimir Putin represented a serious long-term geopolitical threat to the West, to our societies so we wanted to get out of that particular dynamic.”
“If you [Canadian companies] are in places and doing business that is consistent with the national interest and foreign policy objectives of the government of Canada we would do everything we can to assist you, but if you are not you are on your own. The government would not aid you commercially if you are on the wrong side of the geopolitical situation.”
0648: Plenary on The Rise Of Geoeconomics with Sebastian Kurz, former federal chancellor of Austria; Stephen Harper, former prime minister of Canada; Christine Tsai, CEO of 500 Global; André Estevez, senior partner and chairman of BTG Pactual; Shu Nyatta, founder of Bicycle Capital; Edith Yeung, general partner of Race Capital and Dr. Daniel Yergin, vice chairman of S&P Global.
Mohammed Al-Jadaan, Saudi Arabia’s minister of finance: “In this region there is a lot of commitment to reform and that reform is continuing and we have the resources to deliver on the plans. But we need also to be watchful and provide whatever support we can to our region while the world tries to stabilize itself.”
Steven Mnuchin, founder and managing partner of Liberty Strategic Capital: “National security starts with economic security. You need strong economies to create opportunities for people to also fund whatever type of military or other defensive capabilities one needs to.”
“I believe that over the next five years we are gonna see tremendous advances in carbon recapture technology. We should be investing as much money into carbon recapture as we are in other forms for renewables… the short-term solution to the climate [issue] is carbon recapture as opposed to just energy transformation. I think this is obviously a global issue that needs to be dealt with.”
#FII6: "The short-term solution to #ClimateChange is really around carbon recapture. This is obviously a global issue and it needs to be dealt with," says Mnuchin#NewGlobalOrder #ImpactOnHumanity https://t.co/88q4xIBLiS pic.twitter.com/LELrM6eaTq
— Arab News | Business (@ArabNewsBiz) October 26, 2022
Sheikh Salman bin Khalifa Al-Khalifa: “We have to start talking on what needs to change about financing the climate crisis, we need to include the financing of fossil fuels as part of the mix. Today, the largest carbon issue you have is coming from the oil and gas sector. And yet you cannot find the financing to put scrubbers on a refinery in Texas, nobody would touch it. If you have carbon coming out of a certain industry you have to provide the financing to clean up big portions of that industry and it is going to be the industry in which you will get the most carbon reduction per dollar deployed, and yet that is not being done.”
Mohammed Al-Jadaan: “Obviously climate change and the impact of climate is a very serious issue and it is not going to be resolved by one country’s effort, it will need to be collaborative. Without the world really cooperating and collaborating to deal with climate change, you are not going to resolve it. I think the world is aware, the world is trying to deal with this, the multilateral institutions are trying to support countries to deal with climate change impact. I can tell you in the region where really, it is not known, but we are making a lot of efforts to actually reduce emission to deal with climate change, to invest in renewables. We are investing as much in conventional energy but we are also investing in climate change initiatives... but it will need to be a global cooperative effort.”
Steven Mnuchin, founder and managing partner of Liberty Strategic Capital: “Doom and gloom was COVID-19. Shutting down the world economy and the cost of doing that both from an economic and health side was extraordinary, and the world came out of that. The challenges we have are not nearly as big.”
Sheikh Salman bin Khalifa Al-Khalifa: “The COVID-19 model is [what] we have tried across everything to do with government execution. You put in place a good solid plan, you make sure that there’s the right entities that need to be there… they are given the resources and supported with the execution.”
“When you look at the Gulf economies compared to the rest of the world, we see that the picture for GCC economies is a positive one at this stage today even with the multitude of global challenges. Why is that? Because there have very clear well-articulated, strategic development plans that are being executed consistently across the region.”
“Consistently across the region, the biggest driver of growth was non-oil growth in real terms. It was the non-oil growth that was driving the economies… today across the Gulf by and large... the majority of our non-oil GDP is economic activity built around consumption and imports. And the big opportunity is for us to transform those economies into economies that are based on production and exports for the non-oil sector. And as we move from consumption economies to production economies we have a real opportunity set that we are building a strong economic activity.”
Mohammed Al-Jadaan: “I think we are also underestimating our ability to adapt and to deal very quickly with issues… [the] food crisis is one example, the world managed to control the food crisis to a large extent compared to the last few months.”
Steven Mnuchin, founder and managing partner of Liberty Strategic Capital: “A year ago people underestimated the risks… we are now overestimating those risks. All of a sudden everybody is turning incredibly negative.”
“We are seeing very clearly across the world energy security is national security… the world wanted to get off carbon, this transition is gonna take longer. There are source of energy that has to be invested in beyond just renewables.”
“The third point I would say is the geo-political risk, forget the economic risk, is higher than we’ve seen in modern times. I think that the US relation with China… the two largest economies must figure out how to communicate and co-exist… I think the world needs to come together on this situation with Ukraine, we need at least a temporary ceasefire if there is not a long-term solution… we need to deal with these issues and come together on them.”
Sheikh Salman bin Khalifa Al-Khalifa, Bahrain’s minister of finance and national economy: “There are certainly a multitude of challenges that the world faces, inflation is certainly one of them, driven by the disruption in supply chains coming out of COVID-19, compounded by the conflict in Europe and now it is a period where there is food price inflation, energy price inflation and that is a big issue. One of the positive aspects that we are seeing very recently is that shipping costs are coming down.”
“Now it is extremely important to focus on the supply chains, supply chains will play a critical role. We saw Saudi Arabia launch the Global Supply Chain Resilience Initiative and it will be extremely important for countries all over the world to participate and make sure domestically within their region they are building resilience on the supply chain.”
Sheikh Salman bin Khalifa Al-Khalifa, on his outlook: “The danger is we are beginning to see economic activity slow down in many parts of the world at a time inflation is very high, it is further compounded by the fact the at a lot of countries have limited fiscal space coming out of COVID-19. COVID-19 battered the ships, battered the sail and then we are sailing into another storm, and that is what people need to be prepared for.”
Mohammed Al-Jadaan, Saudi Arabia’s minister of finance: “You cannot look at the world in one way… we have seen how the world is almost split into [the] optimistic side that are looking for the future, those who have planned, that who are able to make long-term decisions and prepare themselves for difficult times are reaping the benefits. Those who haven’t are facing difficult times… and the world is going through a very, very difficult time.”
“I think what we need to do is encourage cooperation and collaboration. The world needs stability, predictability for macrofinance to be available, for investment to be available. And that is becoming very difficult with all the shocks we have seen.”
“We are talking with international organizations to try and help, I can tell you within the region what Saudi Arabia did was we mobilized the regional multilateral development institutions to make sure we provide support to countries in the region, but we are also doing our part. We worked with Indonesian presidency in the G20 to provide some support to the world at large but also to the low-income countries and emerging markets when it comes to energy and food. We are providing support bilaterally, and we are making sure we stay the course. We have a vision that we started a few years ago, we prepared ourselves and we are reaping the benefits.”
Mohammed Al-Jadaan, on his outlook six to months ahead: “It is very difficult to predict what is coming to the world, but worldwide it is going to be a very difficult six months. Regional, I think the region is largely split into two areas, one is the Gulf region I think the next 6 months or the next 6 years are going to be actually very good. The wider region is going to be very difficult and it is our role to help that wider region. Worlwide, I think we need to work to ensure that there is more collaboration, cooperation to bring about stability, and that is what we are doing.”
0628: Plenary on The Pulse On Global Macrofinance with Mohammed Al-Jadaan, Saudi Arabia’s minister of finance, meanwhile will sit with his Bahraini counterpart Sheikh Salman Khalifa Alkhalifa and Steven Mnuchin, founder and managing partner of Liberty Strategic Capital.
Nelson Peltz, chief executive and founding partner of Trian Partners: “The most important thing for a CEO is to have glasses that have bifocals… keep eye on next quarter, but needs to have long term vision to understand where the business is going and do they have a plan to get there.”
“We might have fooled ourselves when we invested in Procter and Gamble, we did not buy the whole company, but we looked at it at a vantage point and as a result it was a rocky start to our relationship but it went out to be tremendously profitable for its shareholders.”
“My impression of Saudi Arabia is an old one. But I found to my pleasure a very warm welcoming, informed and intelligent people who have moved so quickly into this century. It is amazing. But more importantly, there is a sense of freedom, warmness, kindness which I was really surprised because I have old impression.”
“The Kingdom got to continue to do what they’re doing. They are on a roll that I would not like to see them get off, just do more of it… be careful when [they] stray off that path.”
0606: Richard Attias, chief executive of FII Institute, opens the second day of the Future Investment Initiative, with a plenary session with Nelson Peltz, chief executive and founding partner of Trian Partners, who will discuss how to ensure success for and through the long-term – across the world, amidst decades of change and turbulence.
